


I Saw You There

by starryfrens



Series: Vampires Will Hurt You, And You Will Hurt Them [1]
Category: My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampires, Angst, Frerard, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Rikey, Slow Burn, Vampire Turning, Vampires
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:48:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 17
Words: 86,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27551041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starryfrens/pseuds/starryfrens
Summary: Gerard's been a vampire for five years. The isolation was starting to get to him; the perpetual loneliness, the never ending misery- all of it- and he was becoming increasingly wary of letting anyone else know that.On his way back home one night, he passes by the house of a man he plans to make his next feed and stops by every night for six months to watch him. As you can probably imagine, this can only go poorly because, as it turns out, Gerard's a lot more human that he thought.Make sure to refer back to the series cover (link in description) to access the content warnings for this book.
Relationships: Frank Iero/Gerard Way, Ray Toro/Mikey Way
Series: Vampires Will Hurt You, And You Will Hurt Them [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2013883
Comments: 118
Kudos: 58





	1. i

**Author's Note:**

> so, this idea came kinda suddenly, and i can't tell if it's my affinity for mcr's revenge and bullets albums, but i have been finding myself increasingly interested in all things vampires lately, so i thought, hey, why not?? i've also never written slow burn before so this is gonna be a test on my patience.
> 
> some context before we jump in:  
> A) they're all vamps. that's pretty much all you need to know.  
> B) make sure to read the content warning in the notes of the series description and stay safe  
> C) imagine a timeline where it's chalk-full of religious superstition, outdated practices, and modern tech and lingo. like victorian 21st century  
> D) i'm gonna try and upload on a schedule: every friday, we'll see how that goes  
> E) this chapter is like an intro, a preface if you will, i'll get more into depth later on
> 
> hope this is as cool as it sounds in my head!!!
> 
> follow me:  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

Gerard shut the door behind him. The room was just as dark and cold as the night outside but he shivered and rubbed his eyes, trying to get the floating spots out of his vision. He licked the remaining blood from the cracks and wrinkles in his bottom lip, digging the sticky, metallic liquid out of the spots where his teeth dug into his skin. You'd think that after all these years he would be better about biting his lip, but when you're immortal, so are your filthy habits.

He drifted through the living room without pausing, passing by the couch that he usually threw himself onto to rest after feeds to let the blood settle in his gut. This time he had the slight of a frown, or a scowl, on his face.

"How was she?" Mikey didn't look up from his book, tapping his nails on the table he was sitting at, with his back turned to Gerard.

Mikey had been bloodthirsty his entire life, apparently he was born with a full mouth of teeth and no one thought much about it until his mother, according to Gerard, had to switch to bottle feeding him because he would bite her while he suckled and her superstition got to her head. If only the poor woman knew. 

Mikey was too anxious to feed directly like his brother did, straight to the neck, he preferred picking up whatever the other guys didn't eat so that he knew he wasn't the one to hurt them; not that he knew what it was even like not to hurt someone, but he remembered seeing how distraught Gerard and his friends were when they'd accidentally step on the dog's tail, so he figured it wasn't something he'd want to call his life's ambition. But he digressed, running his tongue over his top row of teeth and pressing it into the sharp tip of one of his fangs, flipping to the last page of his book.

"Anemic bitch." Gerard sighed, shoving his hands in his pockets. "Tasted like hotel tap water."

"Lukewarm?" Mikey tilted his head to the side, finishing his chapter and closing the book with a particularly loud _clap._

"Lukewarm."

"I take it you didn't bring any leftovers?" Mikey turned around to face him with his pleading-little-brother eyes as Gerard strolled over to stand in the doorway for a second.

"Trust me, even if I did, you wouldn't want any." Gerard sat down at the table, across from his brother.

"Fair enough."

They sat there playing cards and musing on about the endless droning on of their lives, and Mikey repeated that Ray needed to just _'hurry the fuck up so I can get a decent meal around here.'_

Mikey hadn't been out to feed in the five years that the guys had been living together, resorting to reading book after book cover to cover until he went insane and moved on to the next one. His favorite part was waiting for Gerard to get back home and give him a new book that he found in his victim's house after feeding on them that he thought he might like, usually the most worn down one on the shelf that was obviously their favorite. Gerard was always right. Mikey always liked them. This constant lulling on was still easier to handle than the descriptions of how deep fangs can puncture carotid arteries. He used to find it so natural, so easy, so fine and fulfilling, but one night changed that and he would never feel the same way again. It was like a piece of him had gotten staked but the rest of him was salvaged and forced to live with the wound of the memory forever instilled in his tissue, deep like a scar.

He wasn't very good at hiding his shame, though, he pretty much looked sad and distraught all the time, but he hardly let anyone see how hard it was still hitting him, all these years later. Mikey was miserable, and he hated himself for dumping his little black cloud's torrential downpour on Gerard.

Gerard commented on this all the time, trying his best to be lighthearted about it, even though he knew that Mikey wasn't going to invite him to join his sorrows more than he already had. Gerard just wanted to be there, to be present, to be as close with him as he used to be, but nothing worked. It was like chipping away at a granite shelf with a toothpick, but some millennia later, progress might be made, right? No sense in giving up.

"I'm telling you man, I know you've made up your mind, whatever, but if you're gonna live forever you gotta learn how to bite again and do this yourself. Take it from me, they're not gonna care if you're gentle or not. As far as I know, some of 'em like it rough." Gerard giggled, shifting his weight in the chair.

"Hm…" Mikey knew he was right, but there was just something innately disturbing about looking someone in the eyes and fucking draining them out that just didn't sit right with him, even though that was all he'd ever known. He didn't like to think about it.

"Listen, I don't know how many times I have to tell you that I'm not mad at you for what you did-"

"It's not that." Mikey rolled his eyes as he blinked and tried not to sound too aggressive. "That was five years ago, I'm- I'm over that. It's just-" Mikey got cut off by the front door slamming shut.

"Carry-out, motherfuckers." Ray threw his cloak off his shoulders and slapped two pint-sized pouches of blood on the table like slabs of meat. They were always so neatly packaged, all clean and still warm. Ray was exceptional at his blood bank packing job before he got turned until he started having to take 'smoke breaks' while the patients were getting their blood drawn. He didn't smoke. His coworkers just assumed he was afraid of needles, and that couldn't be farther from the truth. "You hungry, Gee?"

"I just got home, already ate. It was shit but it'll do." Gerard pushed one of the pouches over to Mikey. He fixed his eyes on his lap and was silent for a while, pensive.

Ray scraped the side of one of his fangs with his thumbnail and brushed his long, brown, curly hair out of his face with his other hand. Ray was at least a hand taller than Gerard and Mikey, the surface of the table came just below his hip, so he liked to lean on it and pretend like he was listening to whatever was going on in the chairs around it. He did want to care, though, it's just that his mind was constantly swimming with thoughts and he didn't feel like he had the right to air them out. After a drink and some alone time, he would let himself gently crack open. Patience was key here, and it was always well worth it. Ray was incredible to talk to. He was incredible in general.

It was obvious that the guys weren't too keen on conversation, they had all the time in the world to go over literally anything they wanted, but they still felt like there was just nothing hanging in the room that was interesting enough to talk about. It was lonely, isolating, perpetual, like a bicycle wheel with uniform spokes. Everything always felt the same, everything sounded the same, and everything would continue to spin and push them inevitably further into nothing but more time. If something important was on the line and just out of reach, it would come up eventually. There would always be more time.

Mikey's eyes fluttered shut as he sucked the blood from the nozzle in the pouch, and that was the only sound in the room. It was pitch black, save for the candlelight and warm-orange lamps set to as dim as they would go, sometimes with red sheets draped over the shades if they were too bright. It was like a sensory deprivation tank: this house. The curtains were tacked to the walls so that they didn't move from over the glass, the bathroom mirror was insufficiently painted over and then taken out with Gerard's clumsy hands. He must have fumbled with it because it consequently poured shattered glass down the front of his pants and all in his shoes, which covered him in tiny pin-prick cuts from his trail all the way down to his ankles. It hurt to shower for a couple weeks. It was good that they had all already eaten before that, and that they had all sworn not to feed off of each other, because Gerard was basically a walking, breathing, undead, buffet plate. 

The hardwood floor was dark stained, contrasting the white painted wood panel walls, giving the house a sort of colonial Victorian look, one that Gerard just _dug_ , and that the others didn't mind that much. Gerard was a master of glamor, one solid stare at any place for long enough made anything look as beautiful as a palm stone of opal.

Gerard's memory was one to fail him, he tended to talk a lot in the moment, gushing about every observation, because he'd been alive long enough to know that he'd soon forget. Eventually, his thoughts did return to him and he'd blurt them out, mostly out of context, but everyone knew his little quirks by now, and they were pretty good at seeing inside Gerard's head and living in his little delay with him. He'd had to be silent all night as he floated between the trees, so his mind was running behind, still stalking the outskirts of town, sulking on its way back. Then it knocked on the door.

"Oh-" Gerard leaned forward, resting his chin on the backs of his hands while his elbows dug into the wood of the table. The others listened in. Gerard's little jumps were indicators that he finally remembered what he sat down to say. "I found a guy tonight."

"Hmm?" Ray finally sat down next to Mikey after hovering over him, who had just finished the second pouch of blood and wiped his mouth with his sleeve. He always did this so that he could suck on it when he couldn't sleep at night. "Do tell."

Ray had always wanted company, he was insufferably lonely and petrified of women and scaring them off, so he found peace in companionship and games of poker over crystal glasses of blood diluted with rum. Ray kept one or two pouches stored away in _his_ liquor cabinet, one that he never let the others touch. It was some special variety or something, it must go good with his alcohol. _Classy_.

"Well, he lives about a mile out, over on Roth, near the corner where it meets Greenwich, about half a mile down the road, and I only saw the top of him over his garden fence, but he stayed there for a while smoking a joint, and he has the most luscious black hair, like a crow. Uh- he's short, I'd say five-six, and he has the biggest eyes, they hit the moonlight _just right,_ and-"

"Gerard-" Ray tapped the pads of his fingers on the table, looking up at Gerard and smirking. "Sounds like you're stalking a toy."

"It's not like that!" Gerard protested, letting one of his hands fall palm-down in front of him, fingers stretched out. "His veins pop out like nothing I've ever seen before. I just want to know what he tastes like."

"I know, I know, I'm teasing you, go on." Ray spun his hand in a circle, articulating on his wrist, staring intently at the flame of the single candle in the center of the table and smiling.

"Anyway, he's got neck tattoos. I can't tell if they're protective or not, but I've never had ink before. Like I said, I only caught the top half of him over the fence so I don't know if he has more. I'm pretty sure he has a lot of piercings, I could only catch his gauges, but I persist. He looks prospective, that's all I'm saying." Gerard leaned back in his seat again.

"I can see why. We still have another six months before we need to feed again, so Ray and I could come with you to check this guy out-"

"No-" Gerard cut in, surprising himself with how defensive he was. "I-I mean- Mikey, you've already got sun-burned," _Gesturing at Mikey, who absentmindedly rubbed the tender skin on the back of his neck._ "As- as always it's just easier to hide one of us than three of us, you know? I can work the needle and line, bring back pouches, whatever. You'd think we'd be better at planning this out by now."

"Yeah, you say that… you're right, though." Mikey leaned back in his chair and put down the card that he was fidgeting with. King of Hearts.

"Well, we have forever to figure it out, I'm fucking _tired,_ and the sunrise is hurting my eyes so- _"_ Ray stood up from the table and picked his cloak up off the floor, tossing the empty plastic pouches into the trash on his way down the hall.

" _We_ do, but this guy doesn't." Gerard fluttered his hand at Ray to wave him goodnight.

"Rest well."

They had already stayed out too late, the four a.m. dawn had given Gerard spots in his vision, and he was starting to worry that he was getting sloppy. He'd always been clumsy, ever since birth, but when it came to a huge central star of gas and radiation that could simmer his skin down to the bone, make him known to the public, and get him killed, he didn't want to get too loose. He was more worried about the fate of the guys than himself, knowing that if something were to happen to him, so that it made it so he wouldn't be able to protect and provide for everyone like he always has, and always will, was the worst case scenario. He didn't like to explore that very much. Everyone just assumed that Gerard was the established leader of the group, no one ever said anything about it, they just came to him for help and it was just _normal,_ at least for the five years since he was turned and took advantage of his motherly instinct; but now he felt like he couldn't trust himself with leading and commandeering his little brother around. Mikey had more experience than him, regardless of whether or not he wanted to admit that or even put it to use at all, so it wasn't like he would follow orders that were bullshit, but being an older sibling came with an obligation of responsibility. He had to force himself to swallow his urges to drag everyone out to drool over the new man that he was watching like little kids in a candy shop. 

It was a good thing that this guy lived on the breast of the woods, a nice outcropping of the thicket that covered most of the wilderness in the town. There were plenty of wide trees and dense canopies that Gerard could hide in, nestling himself in the darkness just enough to watch the man glide about inside his house. He could stare at him for weeks, he thought, and he couldn't tell if it was just his intense bloodlust getting stronger, but he felt drawn to him so much that he could hear his heartbeat from twenty feet away. Even if there were places they could all hide in, Gerard wasn't too keen on separating from the group unless there was someone who could keep their eyes on them. This time, there wouldn't be, so he looked forward to the time he could spend alone with his thoughts about what he could do to this guy.

Gerard and Mikey sat at the table in silence for a few minutes, both trying to ignore the incessant drooping of their eyelids in response to the rising of the sun. They hadn't spent any quality time together for a few days, despite being in each other's presence for nearly every waking moment of their entire lives, and especially in the last five years, so Gerard felt like he missed him dearly.

"Besides the boy," Mikey spoke softly. "How have you been lately? I haven't heard much from you."

"I'm fine." Gerard couldn't think of any excuses, he'd been wary of admitting that the isolation was getting to him. 

He looked forward to each Sunday night so that he could trot down the stairs of the deep cave where his nest gathered to meet, just so he could refresh himself with new pairs of sunken eyes other than the ones he was gonna stare at for the rest of eternity. It was like each six month resting period between feeds, the feeling got worse. He longed to go outside more often, not even to bite and get his fill but to be alone in a place where he wouldn't have to look at his brother and remember all the guilt he feels. Gerard didn't want Mikey to feel guilty, but he knew that he couldn't get inside his head and help him with it. Neither of them had control over what happened, so instead of bickering back and forth about who was fine and who was lying, they just resolved to stop talking about it altogether. He knew that Mikey told Ray everything that he didn't want to tell Gerard, like the issues that they blocked out, this one for example, and he didn't mind that at all, since Ray was way better at advice than he was, anyway. So Gerard valued his alone time, especially when he knew Mikey was in good hands, but not as much as he valued being around his brother and caring for him. He just didn't know what to do about that or how to voice that.

"Good." Mikey said, and he stood up, hugged Gerard from behind, and rubbed his face in his hair. That was something he always did when they were kids, and something he would always do. "You should sleep." Mikey pat Gerard's hands and grabbed a blanket off the sofa that he wrapped himself in and started walking down the hall.

"I will, soon. I love you."

"I love you too." Mikey blew out the last lit candle in the hallway and the house was just as bright, making Gerard blink and cover the top of his line of sight with his hand, like he was looking off over the ocean from a pier.

Gerard yawned. He watched the image of that man from earlier again in his mind, silently admiring how he moved and how he looked _so beautiful_ , and promised himself he would go see him again tomorrow once he made sure Mikey and Ray were attended to. He blew out the candle in front of him with a big sigh and retired to his bedroom, where he slept with the covers pulled over his head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	2. ii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome back ! it's vamp day !
> 
> i would like to thank my twitter mutuals for hyping me up on this and for listening to me rant about my characters, i really really appreciate it. <3
> 
> we're finally getting into some developmentz! i wanted to really draw this fic out but i always find myself bored by stories that don't establish dynamics early on, so i'm balancing those two qualities. it's definitely as cool as it sounded in my head. i'm really proud of this work.
> 
> thanks for 50 views!
> 
> follow me if u want 2 ^-^  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

Forest stalker. Plasma thief. Both the beauty and the beholder's eye. A silent force beyond human recognition, but oh so very inclined to be recognized. In fact, Gerard was stricken with this desire, this want, this _need,_ to be seen by anything but his four white walls and the two other men inside them. He didn't want to be found out- per se- no, he just wanted company. Someone he could trust and complain to that wasn't one of his random surface level acquaintances from the weekly gatherings that ultimately didn't care whether he stayed or left. Maybe it was this persistent nudge to stand completely motionless in the woods outside of the house of the man he hadn't been able to make himself stop thinking about; watching, observing, plotting, _hoping_ to get closer to. Or maybe it was the aching pain in his chest that made being around Mikey and Ray insufferable, as he'd been around them for what felt like forever and what would probably _be_ forever. Either way, the sun was starting to set and Gerard was starting to stir, and he would find out a way to slither out into the night and figure out the answer himself. 

"Do you want coffee, Gee?" Mikey poked at the few strands of hair that were protruding out of the blanket that was still over Gerard's head.

"Nmhm." He grumbled, gently rolling over so his back was turned to Mikey, but still sticking his fingers out of the blanket for Mikey to squeeze. 

"Okay, it's 7:30pm now, on the third of April, and Ray and I are gonna go hang out and do whatever once it gets a little darker, so you can do whatever you want." 

Mikey's habit of telling Gerard the time and the date when he woke him up every night was his last comforting grip on reality. He'd always done it, and he always would. It was his way of making it feel like time had passed, since most of the days had been swirling together into one never-ending cycle. This kept Gerard's head above the water. 

He peeked his eyes out of the top of the blanket and squinted at how bright the room was still, streaks of light leaking in through the gaps in the paint on the windows and bleeding onto the curtains. The whole house had a reddish tint when the sun was out, thanks to all the crimson sheets and drapes that were tossed over everything that was just too fucking intense, and Gerard's room was no exception. 

Gerard rolled onto his back again and looked up at Mikey, who smiled slightly at him and pushed his hair back from his forehead. 

"We're gonna leave in about an hour, so if you get ready we can sit at the table for a bit." 

"Okay." He whispered, throat still dry from sleeping with his mouth open by accident. He must've been exhausted. 

Mikey stepped quietly out of the room, and his voice could be heard mumbling low to Ray in early evening stupor. 

Gerard compared this feeling to being woken up early by his mom to go to school as a kid and laying in bed, still for a moment, to listen to her talk to his dad in her actual serious voice instead of the high-pitched sing-songy tone she used around kids. He missed them. 

He waited until his room was just a _little_ darker before he tossed the blankets off of his body and sat on the edge of his bed, breathing and rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. 

Ray passed by the door looking dapper as all hell, dressed in a jet black blazer that he always wore when he hung out with Mikey, ditching the dirty, blood-stained black cloak for something more casual that wouldn't warrant a bunch of stares from people asking him why he was wearing fur in April. Ray subtly walked past Gerard's door a lot, mostly just seeming to show off how hot he knew he looked, the last lick of validation that he needed to stand up a little straighter. Truthfully, though, Ray only did this so that he could check on Gerard through the corner of his eye and make sure he was okay if Mikey wouldn't tell him. Sometimes he would come in and ask him for stories of his and Mikey's youth, always looking a little more amused than anyone usually would be to hear about someone's little brother, but Gerard was glad that they were as close as they were. 

He kept listening to their chattering as he brushed his teeth, the perfume of coffee filling the house. He spat clots of dried blood into the sink. _Gross._ Even when Gerard said he didn't want any, Mikey always left him a little extra coffee at the bottom of the pot and kept it hot so he could have it, since he always changed his mind once he smelled it. 

They were talking about books. Mikey was outlining the entire plot of the one he had been reading last night, pitching his voice accordingly to the riling unexpected and expected events, professing his undying hatred for most of the characters, and talking too fast to notice that Ray was staring at him a little deeper than usual, with his chin resting on the heel of his hand. It's doubtful that Ray even noticed himself, unsure of any of the emotions he'd been feeling lately, but too lazy to sit down and peruse through them. Gerard stood in the doorway of his room for a bit, just listening again. When Mikey was in a good mood, the entire world was at peace because he brought everyone up with him. 

"Evening, Gee." Ray's gaze blinked from Mikey to Gerard for a split second, not interrupting his speech, but enough to acknowledge his presence. 

"Hi." He drifted into the chair on Mikey's right side and leaned on his shoulder. He was still exhausted. 

"Last night's girl made you chase her, huh?" Mikey poked the back of Gerard's hand with his finger. 

"Runners…" Gerard scoffed and let his eyes flutter shut. 

"You know what you need? Ray, can you-" 

"On it." He was up in a second to pour out the last of the coffee into a shiny black mug for Gerard. He set it down in front of him, letting the steam waft into his face. 

"I love you." Gerard mumbled, cupping the mug with both of his hands. "Where are you guys headed?" 

"Probably the liquor store, art shop, I don't know, just to hang out for a bit, do you need any more paint?" Mikey glanced over at the open door at the end of the hall where Gerard's desk sat under a lamp with a red cloth draped over the top of it. 

"Mmm-" Gerard took a sip of the rich, black, hell-boiling coffee. "I need more peach. I wanna make another portrait sometime soon."

"You got it."

"Oh, and- how much _booze_ do you _need,_ Toro?" Gerard finally started to wake up. 

_"Enough."_ He replied, looking up every now and then with flashing eyes at Mikey, who was still prodding at Gerard's fingers, either to annoy him or to solidify that he was really there. 

Mikey and Gerard always had a very physically close bond, and their childhood was mostly consisting of hugs, pinches, and walking silently into each other's rooms and picking them up for no reason at all. Gerard always gave Mikey piggy-back rides, and Mikey would direct him through the yard by pointing his finger and they'd go on little adventures like that. There weren't any neighbor kids their age or anyone at their school that were even remotely like them, so these little escapades were all they had. All they really had was each other, and a decade and change later that was still true. 

Deep down, Gerard knew that he always wanted it to be that way, he never really intended on leaving his brother when he moved out, especially then, when he knew the things about him that he did, but there was just an itch inside of his intestines that begged for some type of change; some kind of revolution that would dye the scenery some different colors. Sure, it was a lot less anxiety inducing to know what was going to happen everyday, but things had been the same for so long that he was starting to get awfully restless and bored of it. Not that he was bored of Mikey and Ray, but because something told him that it was just _time_ to let something new in. 

Mikey glanced over Ray's shoulder at the curtained window and inhaled deeply. "It's dark enough now, we're gonna go, okay?" 

"Mhm." Gerard sighed and sat straight back up again, drinking more of the coffee. 

"We'll be back in a few hours." Mikey rubbed his face in Gerard's hair before he stood up and led Ray to the door. 

It shut and the house was dead quiet. 

Gerard finished his drink and sat at the table for a few minutes, not thinking anything in particular, just absorbing the time alone and savoring the taste of it on his tongue. He finally got up and left the mug on the table, jogging to get his jacket and shoes so he could walk the mile or so out to the edge of the woods again. 

His heart started beating a little faster. 

-

The night air was crisp and just warm enough to stand leaving a light jacket unzipped. The moon was just a little over half filled, and the stars littered the orange polluted sky like spilled glitter.

Gerard breathed shallowly through his nose as he leaned against an oak tree. He loved the smell of the woods: the cool, humid overgrowth that was tramped down in the exact same spot, a deer trail or vampire footpath, no one would ever tell, and the quiet chattering and cracking of squirrels and rabbits jumping from branch to branch and knoll to knoll to burrow and devour their fills put a glossy sheen over the imagery. Their tiny, fluffy lives were filled with the same routines, hopping to and fro completely unfettered and satisfied. Gerard always felt like he understood animals in most aspects. They were so determined to operate on this clock, this destiny, this instinct, whatever it was, and no one ever paid attention to it. Sure, there were nature documentaries and game pellets, but there were also vampire tales and kits to kill them with, so their pages were written in the same language. The wood that was sharpened into stakes grew in the trees here, and every now and then he would hear one crack and fall and one less familiar face would appear at the weekly gatherings. Any and all creatures of nature murdered by nature itself were one and the same.

The man's house was glowing with soft, orange light, and Gerard could smell the smoke from his wood stove. _He got cold easily._ He had all his curtains open and his space looked so much like _home_ that it almost made Gerard feel bad for soon tearing it from him, for being so vicious, but he didn't put any more thought into it than he had to. There was wreckage in being too sentimental and he'd been trying his hardest to unlearn that in the past five years. His childhood was spent being absolutely content with the way things were and who the person next to him through it all was, but when he was turned he constantly found himself wanting more. His bloodlust had infected him down to his very DNA and was dripping from his maw like saliva and he craved deeper and deeper until he became the gluttonous, pale shadow of who he used to be. It disgusted him. It made him mourn the saint everyone told him he was in his youth. Of course, he didn't see himself that highly then, he didn't have to, but compared to now, he was the damn poster child of holiness. He despised what he'd become, but at least standing there in the last few rows of trees was just enough to take the edge off the loathing. 

The man came to stand in the front window. Gerard swore he was staring right at him, but he wasn't. He smiled with his lips sealed, watching the night curl and spin, holding a cup of some kind of hot drink under his nose so he could breathe it in and try to warm his bones. Finally, Gerard got a good, firm look at him. 

He was dressed head to toe in black, plain short-sleeved v-neck just a touch too tight so that it displayed his sculpted chest just right in the light. His legs were short but thick and strong, and he stood slightly duck-footed. His jeans were torn at the knee. He'd washed his hair, it was less shiny, like a bird feather, hence the prior crow comparison, now it was more frizzy and wavy like some force of nature Gerard couldn't put his finger on. The ocean, maybe. 

There was this glint to him, maybe it was the gentle hum of the neon sign glow of the house on the shape of his body, but Gerard was uncontrollably drawn to him. The way he stood, the gait with which he walked, the way he was wholly fine with being alone, the little upward curvature of the corner of his mouth when he spoke to himself, _shit,_ Gerard felt so helpless standing there, unable to just sprint into his field and breathe in his scent like a fucking buck hunter. He hated this part of life, getting to know someone by stalking them like a cougar; dark and skulking in the night to figure out how they worked and if they'd ever dare to tell a single soul if they ever dared to find their wits and keep a thread of their own after being sucked dry. He hated this intimate feeling in his chest. He hated the fact that these humans lived normal lives with their normal friends in their normal houses before they died a normal death; oh how Gerard was emptily humanoid. 

But this man was captivating, like a movie you can't tear yourself away from even after knowing it's going to make you want to crawl out of your skin and break your heart. This man was like nothing Gerard had ever seen before. 

He was so involved, in fact, that he let a compartment in his brain fly open, slip, absentmindedly, and he didn't notice that it had happened until the man's head snapped around to look behind him, going from peacefully contemplative to unnerved in the twinkle of an eye. He stared at the same spot for half a minute or so, shoulders rising towards his ears ever so gradually. He set his cup down on a low table that Gerard couldn't see as he traveled to the back of the room where he was looking. He picked up a heavily embellished dagger that caught the light in a blinding shimmer from the same table as he cautiously tip-toed across the floor. 

Then Gerard saw it. He was focusing so intently on how charming his subject was that he threw his Bible from its spot on the black floor-to-ceiling bookshelf against the back wall of the room from twenty feet away. He stuck around long enough to watch him put it back and close the curtains with an anxious, frustrated frown on his face. Gerard thought he heard his garden door open. As much as he wanted to see him a little closer, to just _be_ in the presence of him, he couldn't let him see him, so he hurriedly retreated off into the night again.

Gerard stared at his feet as he walked home. He sniffled in the cold wind and followed the stupid little groove in the sweet grass, tucking his hands under his armpits so that he wouldn't ruin another goddamn thing. 

He opened his front door with a huff and slammed it. He didn't even check to see if Mikey and Ray had returned yet. He just grabbed the first thing he saw, which was a soot-stained shot-sized glass candle holder with the tiniest sliver of red wax left in the bottom, and threw it as hard as he could against the wall to his right. It disintegrated and fell like snow to the floor behind an armchair that no one sat in. 

"God, _fucking_ smite me!" Gerard kicked his shoes off in the doorway, something everyone hated, and threw his jacket hard against the wooden floor. 

_"Fuck! Shit!" And many other screamed expletives and moans that are not worth repeating…_

He stormed off to his room and pushed the door shut so hard that the long candle in the sconce across the hall fell to the floor and snapped in two. Gerard never used to be so filled with rage before this. He never raised his voice at anyone, never broke things, never acted like such a _pathetic_ loser before. He had always been civil, calm, gentle, and loving, even and especially in the face of something so vexing. Gerard felt like he was twisted, corrupted, crooked, _evil._ He was truly losing his touch. What happened to him? 

"Gee?" Mikey tapped the backs of two of his fingers on the door. 

He didn't reply. 

"Gerard, are you alright?" 

He still couldn't get any words out, even though there was so much that he wanted to say. _I messed it up, I'm gonna get myself killed, I'm gonna hurt you- Oh, end me, I'm gonna hurt Mikey-_

"I'm coming in, you better have pants on." Mikey's tender brown eyes met Gerard's in the dark. 

Despite the fire in his gut that was casting the smell of burning flesh into the air, he felt welcomed by his brother's presence, but he made it very obvious that he needed to distance himself by the way he hugged his legs to his chest against the back wall on the floor. Mikey took this in and sat about three feet away from him on the foot of his bed, facing him. He didn't say anything. He didn't have to. His face spoke every word that it needed to. 

Gerard's stomach turned. He hoped that maybe having Mikey there would help bring his rationale back to the surface and he wasn't gonna lie, it kind of did, but he was still terrified. 

"Did something happen?" Mikey murmured, sliding his shoe against the floor to make a hushed scraping sound. 

Gerard whimpered, taking in a belly-full of air to keep from falling apart into more pieces than the glass he broke in the living room.

Mikey only really listened to Gerard's cue for a minute and fourteen seconds before he moved to sit cross-legged on the floor next to him, gently putting his hand on his arm. "What happened?"

Gerard faced Mikey with teary eyes and a shaky bottom lip. He took a few deep breaths and adjusted himself on the floor. "I- I lost control- I- I ruined it- I-" Gerard's palms clapped against the floor as he struggled. 

"Gee," Mikey had a way of speaking so softly to him, even before, when he didn't even need to. Mikey was the only home Gerard really had, and he felt so indescribably safe with him. He just wished they could go back to the way things were so that he could acknowledge this for no reason at all instead of for the plethora of reasons that he had to now. "It's okay." 

"Is it, Mikey? Is it? I mean, I made his fucking Bible fall from twenty feet away. I'm fucking infatuated with him and I don't know why. Why-..." _Sigh._ "Why does my head get in the fucking way all the time? I'm losing my shit. I'm getting sloppy."

Mikey tilted his head to the side and turned his torso toward Gerard. "Don't say that, Gee, you're just tired. Everyone has bad days, you know that, I mean, look at me." 

"What's wrong with me?" He cut in rather sharply, throwing his head back into the wall. 

"Nothing, Gerard." Mikey pitched Gerard's chin up with his fingers so that he would look at him. He just pulled himself out of his grasp, but Mikey pulled him right back in. "Look at me."

"I can't do this. I'll mess it up." Gerard realized he couldn't escape confronting this, he couldn't hide, he had to just face it. He felt like a kitten trapped in the corner between fight and flight. Boxed in, there was only one way to go, but he didn't even think about what was coming out of his mouth. "Why did you do this to me?" He instantly regretted it. 

Mikey jumped and looked taken aback. He tried to say something but nothing came out. Instead he just sputtered until the broken syllables slowly became words. "I'm- I'm sorry, I-" 

"Stop- stop, I- fuck, just- you- I didn't mean it, okay?" Gerard buried his head in his arms after Mikey's hands dropped into his lap. 

"I know, I know, just- I'm so fucking sorry." His voice cracked at the last line and he stood up and walked out. Ray appeared shortly after and followed him but paused at the door to look at Gerard. 

He didn't say anything. Gerard couldn't see his face very well through the tears but he looked dismayed at him. 

God, he hated it when Ray was upset with him. It felt like it did when his father was about to yell at him the next time he had his chance, an oddly familiar, threatening, dreadful emotion. 

It felt like forever that he was standing there, glaring at him, and Gerard felt ever sicker every passing tick. But eventually he continued on with heavy footsteps. He was still dressed in his blazer and he still had his shoes on. Gerard prayed that the house would just be silent again, but he had to live the rest of his days with another imprint of Mikey's sobbing on the other side of his wall again. 

It made him queasy. He felt like he was dying. His world crashed down every time he heard those familiar whines, and it hurt him that he couldn't get up and soothe them. He couldn't fix it. Could he fix anything? 

This was going to sting for a long time. This was going to plague him until he could leave the house again tomorrow night- that is- if he even allowed himself that luxury. He'd never skipped a night of stalking before, but since when was he in need of keeping things the same? If this was the only way to justly punish himself for being such an asshole to his brother, then by all means was he going to marinate and rot in it until he felt like he didn't deserve it anymore. Until he felt like he didn't deserve Mikey and Ray anymore, so that they could chase him down the midnight path, yelling at him that he was just insane and drunk off his head. They'd convince him that he deserved it. Tonight they were exceptional at that job. Other times he was able to just swallow and chase it down with the knowledge that Mikey would still love him unconditionally because that's what he _said,_ so he could go out and process his shit well enough to come home and forgive himself, but this time it hurt too much to even give himself the permission to work it out any other way. 

So, he sat with his ear on the paneled wall, listening to his brother cry, and timing his shaky breaths to his trembling hands in a symphonic measure of heartbreak and sorrow. 

"Hey, God, feel free to cast me into the fire now. I'm sure that damnation is easier than this." Gerard stood up, gently closed his door, and lay on his belly in his bed on top of the unmade covers, with his face flat in the pillows. 

He couldn't un-hear his crying voice. He couldn't make the sound stop. Even if he was away from the seams between their two rooms, it still repeated in his head like a haunted scratched CD. But oh well, he deserved it, at least he thought he did, so the misery would have to do for now, and he settled in it until his eyes closed. 

Gerard always liked to see his victims squirm, to drink in the adrenaline and watch the fear fill and drain from their eyes with the color of their faces, so why did scaring that guy make him suffer so much? Why was this so much different? Why did he hate this new sensation? He thought that was what he wanted. He was a dirty fucking liar if that's what he meant with this new prospect. He was a monster if this is what he truly wanted. 

Gerard slept until the next sunset on the last lingering thought that he was a dirty fucking lying monster. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	3. iii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's vamp day again!!! i've been so impatient to get this chapter out for the literal /weeks/ that i've had it done, and it's really a relief to finally post it. i have so many cool developments in the next few chapters so i feel very mean making people wait a week for content, but this should be enough to hold you over ^_^
> 
> i really hope you like this chapter, i would say it means a lot to me but this whole fic and- honestly- all my work- means a lot to me, so this is like a little piece of that. this fic is gonna be a part of me for a very long time and i'm happy about that, it felt like my last fic (razz) was over way too quickly.
> 
> thankyou for reading. thankyou for listening to me gush over my drafts. thankyou for commenting such kind things <3
> 
> follow me if you feel like it :3  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

Mikey crept into Gerard's room, followed by Ray, who had opened the door first. Their footsteps made the boards creak ever so slightly, and Mikey had been sweating so much that the soles of his feet stuck to the floor with each pace. "Gerard." He didn't coo like he usually did, he sounded stern and tired and his voice was scratchy from all the crying he'd done the night before.

Gerard tried his hardest to pretend that he was still asleep so that Mikey would lay his hand on his back or do _something_ to show that he loved him still, but he didn't. He just stood over him there, breathing on him, voiceless.

"Can you at least pretend to wake up, now?" Mikey shifted his weight and stood rigidly, like he was cold, or trying to hold himself together.

Gerard rolled over pretty much instantly and faced him, but couldn't look him in the eye. "What time is it? Fourth of April, right?"

"I just-" Mikey looked over his shoulder at Ray, who was standing a few feet back at the end of the bed. He nodded. "I want to talk about it now. I want to clean up whatever mess we've got going on, be- because I feel like I haven't known you for five years and I don't like it."

Gerard swallowed. He felt the same way, but he had no idea how to tackle the overwhelming number of thoughts that were all trying to come out at once, like a bear squeezing through a doggy-door.

"But this'll only work if you're both in this, okay?" Ray finally butt in, stepping a little closer to Mikey and accidentally tapping Gerard's foot with his hand while he was trying to lean against the mattress.

"Okay." Gerard mumbled, still not looking at anything or anyone in particular.

"Okay." Mikey sighed. "We've been over this for half a decade, you know what happened. You know how it all went down, we both do. We both understand that there's nothing we can do to change it, but I need you to stop pretending like it isn't all my fault." Mikey sat down in the space where Gerard's body curved, and his back was against his bent knees.

"Mikey, no, it's- it's not your fault, what are you talking about?" Gerard tried to take his brother's hand, but he put it in his lap, away from him.

"How could you have caused it, then? How else could it have gone if it was all on you? How was _me_ biting _you_ something that is _your_ fault?" Mikey waved his hands in the air as he spoke, gesturing one at himself and the other at Gerard accordingly, and pointing them both at him at the last phrase.

"I'm trying to say that it wasn't either of our faults. I'm trying to say that you had no control over-"

"I lost control, Gerard, isn't that a big enough red flag for you? I kept all those urges down for _years_ and never bit anyone till I just blacked out and fed off of my own brother, how is that not enough for you to blame me?"

"Because I can't fucking take ever being mad at you!" Gerard sat up in a rush, slapping his hands on the covers. He hated how high he raised his voice. He lowered it. "I just- I need to just- _fuck,_ I'm so sorry." He rubbed his face with both hands, pressing his palms into his eyes.

"I find that hard to believe. You seemed mad enough at me last night after you made your boy have a little fright."

"Oh, don't bring _him_ into this…" Gerard could still see him behind his closed lids, shoulders risen to his ears, holding a knife, terrified…

"Then what? What am I supposed to think that you feel? How am I supposed to just move on from what happened when you won't even tell me how good of a sleep you've gotten? How am I supposed to know anything about you when you're just slipping away? You've never acted like this before. Ever since I hurt you-"

"You didn't hurt me, Mikey." Gerard stressed his name, wanting so badly to just look him in the eyes so he could take all the guilt and shame from them and pile it on his own psyche so he could crush it.

"Then what did I do to you?" Mikey finally turned to face him and met his eyes, and all Gerard saw, instead of a lapping dam gate he could easily open and relieve of its pressure, was an endlessly deep sea, one that would flourish and feed the land for as long as the drought held off. All Gerard saw was an ocean, and all he had was an eyedropper and a blue china bowl.

He couldn't answer that question. He couldn't bring himself to say the first thing that came to his mind. He couldn't tell his little brother, his family, his _blood,_ that he had turned him into this lying ball of rage, a matted strip of hair knotted so tightly that it would have to be ripped from the scalp, sucking like a leech on the supple flesh of any sense of solace he could find in tepid pools.

"I know." Mikey's voice cracked. He sounded like he wanted to get up and run to his room again, bury his face in his pillow again, and kick and moan again like he did the night before. Mikey sounded like he hated every second of this. "I know what I did, Gerard. I know that it still haunts you. I know you still have nightmares, I can hear everything you cry to yourself on the other side of the wall, and I know that you can hear me, too. You're not evil if that scar on your neck isn't healed yet."

Gerard didn't say anything.

"I'm not gonna hate you if you hate me."

The whole world fell silent. They could hear each other's hearts beating. 

Ray looked fairly proud of Mikey, as he'd been the one to comfort him the most over the past few months, and he was the one that had talked Mikey down from just giving up and letting Gerard ignore his problems for the seventieth time. He laid a strong hand on his shoulder. Mikey didn't shake it off. Ray also looked like this was the worst torture in the world, he hated seeing the guys upset, especially at each other, and none of this was helping. 

Ray was classy, sharp, the smartest guy that they both had ever known, and he had a knack for being the sweetest soul on the planet. Just having him there in the room made it easier to be this miserable. Ray felt an immense amount of iniquity from 'dumping' his issues on anyone, he used to have to be absolutely shitfaced drunk to be able to get a word out about mild stress so that he would forget in the morning, but the longer he lived with the Way brothers, the less alcohol it took to get him to loosen up. He trusted Mikey with his life, undoubtedly, so he went to him most of the time, stumbling and tripping over the threshold of his bedroom door because he was nauseous with how upset he felt. He had to give up all that he had when he got turned because he was so damn afraid of hurting someone close to him, so he was building his life back up with grains of sand, trying to make a firm foundation before he started using the rest to make bricks and mortar. Ray hadn't told anyone that the sand was falling through the cracks of his hands and embedding itself under his fingernails before sinking into the ground. He just needed an extra set of hands to hold him steady. He thought that maybe going along with whatever everyone else at the house and the gatherings were doing would help solidify his erosion so that he wouldn't have to ask for help, but it never did. He just kept having to start all over, get to know himself all over, and remember what it was like to breathe, living or not, all over again. He hoped that he could at least try and achieve this by making himself useful: a helper, a provider, someone to lean on, and he saw that in Gerard. He was like a little brother to Ray, even though he was actually several months older than him, but he still felt compelled to protect him and nurture him when he was upset and glare at him from across the room when he did something stupid, so this was just another one of those times. It didn't quite feel right, though, Ray knew that he did this so that maybe someone would check on him, since he needed to be cared for and whispered to more than he needed to look out for anything. Someday, he hoped, they would all get there.

He sat there at Gerard's feet, watching their minds tick right in time. He could read exactly what they were feeling, and the emotions were the same. Ray blinked, silently observing the splotchy pigment filling Gerard's face, little by little. His hand was still on Mikey's shoulder and his thumb swiped back and forth over his bare skin a couple times before he stopped himself. _Why did I do that?_

Before Ray could evaluate that, Gerard started to cry. He let himself fall forward into Mikey's chest and just hugged him. Mikey hugged back and he broke.

He was quiet for a moment, jolting as the sobs hit him in waves, breathless, until he gasped and groaned. "I fucking hate you!" Gerard croaked, clutching fistfuls of Mikey's shirt in his hands. _"You_ did this to me!" He choked as everything just poured out of him, rotten sewage from his mouth contaminating the pristine lake in Mikey's eyes that was glittering there just a second ago. _"You_ made me this way, _you_ betrayed me, _you_ broke the promise, _you ruined my life!_ What happened to us, Mikey? What happened?" Gerard shook with it. He shook with how much anger he had in him, and this was the only way he thought he was able to let it out. It just convulsed out of him like an earthquake, and he swore that the ground was throbbing with his aching heart.

Mikey rubbed his face in Gerard's hair. He didn't say anything. He would never hate Gerard. Nothing his older brother could ever do would ever make him feel that way. Not even this.

"I'm so sorry." Gerard spoke in a quavering voice, taking one of his hands off of Mikey's back to find one of Ray's hands to hold. He squeezed it once he got it. "I'm _so_ sorry."

"Don't be." Mikey whispered gently at him again, something that Gerard was so soothed to hear. _"I'm_ sorry. I'm never going to ever be able to make this up to you but- but if there's anything you need from me, just- just tell me, okay? Or if you want me to go and leave you alone, then-"

 _"Stay."_ Gerard dropped Ray's hand and hugged Mikey in closer to him. "Don't go. I can't lose you."

"Then I won't." Mikey sighed. He tugged at Gerard's hair and set his chin on top of his head. He felt so much better. The weight was off his chest, at long last, and he could finally rest on the fact that now he _knew_ that Gerard hated him with every ounce of his being for what he'd done. This was the closure he'd been waiting five years for and it was just as sweet as he had imagined it would be. He glanced over at the clock on Gerard's bedside table. "It's 9:47pm on the fourth of April, and I love you, Gerard."

"I love you, too, Mikey."

-

Gerard walked slowly out into the dining room. He'd woken up alone after he fell asleep in Mikey's arms, and he shivered slightly, even though he wasn't cold. Ray was sitting at the table, intermittently sipping a crystal glass filled with water and fidgeting with the box of playing cards.

"Hey." Gerard didn't look up, he just sat down and laid his palms on the tabletop.

"Mikey's talking a walk, by the way. He thought that you'd sleep all night, he just left a minute ago, so he'll be back eventually." Ray scanned Gerard with sympathetic eyes, looking into him. Gerard usually barricaded himself inside his brain, more so lately, so Ray only tried the lock out of habit, but this time the door was unlocked and he walked right in. Gerard's walls had been completely demolished, dynamited, and the sludge was leaking out of him and onto the floor. Gerard was an ever-flowing river that had finally surpassed the dam of sticks and mud fifty miles upstream. He was a flood, but luckily, he missed all the cities, so he didn't take anyone else out. In fact, he fed the crops while he was at it. It had been a long, grueling summer.

Gerard hummed and brought one of his knees up to his chest so he could set his tired chin on it. "Do you think I'm a monster, Ray?"

Ray jumped a little, cocking his head to the side and narrowing his eyes at him. "What makes you think that I would think that?"

Gerard retained his gaze on the backs of his hands, counting each bundle and strand of purple veins and arteries, following how they coiled and branched out around the bones in his fingers. "I hate my own brother."

"Well," Ray started, darting his eyes around to try and make the words legible. "You love him, don't you?"

"Yeah, I do, but- but how can you love someone that you hate at the same time?"

"I mean, those are two vastly different emotions. The world is full of contradictions, Gerard. People are afraid of heights but they jump out of airplanes like it's the only thing keeping their heads on straight, they stay at jobs that make them break down every Sunday morning just because they pay well, asthmatics still play sports, I could go on."

Gerard breathed, trying to make sense of the tidal wave pool of thoughts in his head. 

"It'll take a while, but your next step is to forgive him, you know that, right?"

"I know." Gerard realized that he really needed a hug, so without thinking too much about it, he just stood up and strolled over to where Ray was sitting and put his hand on his shoulder. Ray got it right away and enveloped him in his arms. He was warm, safe, and he smelled like pine, mint, and metal. Gerard knew what the metallic smell was: Ray smelled like blood. He always did. No amount of scrubbing heavily fragranced soaps in the shower would ever mask it.

They stood there for a few minutes before Ray inhaled sharply and pointed his finger up in the air, pulling away from the hug. Gerard looked up at him like something was wrong, but Ray just looked down at him.

"I thought of another one: you still have to give cats baths."

Gerard sighed through his nose and hugged Ray a little tighter. "I've met a handful of cats that like to swim, actually."

"See? There you go. Be a cat that likes to go to the beach." He patted his back a couple times. "Oh, and you're not a monster, Gee. You're just a vampire with communication issues."

"Thanks."

A minute later, Mikey returned from his walk with a bouquet of white roses and a refreshed look on his face. He filled a jar halfway up with water at the sink and put the flowers in it, and retrieved a small bag of blood from a cabinet. He poured all of it into the jar and used the stems of the roses to stir it. He turned around to face Ray and Gerard, holding it in both of his hands. "Blood roses." He said.

"You couldn't just get red roses?" Ray asked.

"If there were any, do you think that I would have picked these?" Mikey set the vase of flowers down on the center of the table in between two candle holders and stood to the right of the two. "I want in." He whined, and drove his way between them so that they could each wrap an arm around him. Mikey got what he wanted and leaned his forehead on the side of Gerard's head, breathing in his scent and his greasy hair.

None of them said anything, but Ray could feel that the energy between the brothers was far more calm, instead of the awkward silence that had fallen in the space this time a couple days ago. He hated that feeling. He hated being the mitigator, even though it gave him a sense of purpose, and always being the median that separated who was right and who was wrong made him feel trapped. He joined this household for _friendship,_ but instead he was in for conflict management, so he was somewhat relieved to see things starting to change, as was everyone.

"Are you going to see your boy tonight, Gerard?" Mikey let go and lapped up a spilled drop of blood from the counter with his finger and licked it.

"Oh, yeah, I guess so." Gerard stepped back, but still kept one of his hands on Ray's waist. 

"You should. It helps to be alone." Mikey gestured at the sheet white petals that were sitting in the bloody water.

"Mikey, what time is it?" Gerard rushed to pick up his shoes, still in the entryway where he left them the night before. He put them on and slid his jacket on. He didn't really pay attention to the answer.

"Fourteen after midnight, still the fourth. You have five and a half hours before the sun starts to come up, so, go mad."

"Oh, I will." Gerard didn't really care about what happened last time. Sure, he would be more careful, but he was both desperate to get out of the house, and in high need to scare the shit out of anyone but himself. "Love you guys, see you in a few."

He was out the door before either of them could say goodbye to him.

Gerard felt free. He felt like he could breathe. Somehow the four words _"I fucking hate you"_ were more than enough to loosen up the phlegm in his chest so that his lungs could be lungs again. This extra space allowed his heart to quicken and quiver and jump about in its membrane, and the faster it went, the faster he walked, evolving to a dead sprint halfway through the mile long journey. All he could think about was the man's pitch black hair in the pitch black night, the faded color of his faded tattoos, and the shiny reflection of the shiny metal embedded in his face. All he could think about was what he would look like this time, and what little patterns he would show for Gerard to take note of so that he could work around them and sneak into his room and perfectly bite him in his sleep so that he wouldn't feel a thing, or even notice at all that he was slowly being drained and killed. Ideally, Gerard liked to do it this way, where no one woke up, but his last feed was a runner that made him chase her until she cornered herself, and he wasn't gonna lie, he liked the adrenaline rush, but it took its toll on his starving soul. He hoped that this guy would go a little smoother.

He finally got to the spot where he stood last time and roamed past a couple trees so he could get even closer. This was a much better view.

Gerard could see straight in the window, and there he was, facing his right side, sitting in an armchair and watching something on TV. He sat wide with his left leg resting on a footstool straight out in front of him, and the other draped over the side of the chair. One hand was in his hair and the other was tapping a rhythm on his thigh. He twisted a strip of hair between inked fingers. The lights were out, the only lights that allowed Gerard to see him was the bright white screen that flashed in front of him.

 _God,_ Gerard thought, he looked incredible with the light on him like that, the shadows hit his round face and his nose in a way that made him look like a prism, refracting the typical glow that came off of him anyway into a full spectrum of incandescence. 

His lips moved in a way that wasn't like he was talking, they moved like he was singing, paired with the fluidity of his eyelids shutting and his eyebrows furrowing, and Gerard hated that he couldn't hear him. He didn't usually like listening to people scream when he bit them, and he assuredly didn't want to know that he was hurting this guy, but he longed to hear his voice at least once. He would someday, he reminded himself, have patience.

The wind shifted a little, and within a minute, Gerard's nostrils filled with a familiar smell. This man was growing garlic in his garden as a ward. Gerard laughed to himself. How foolish of him to believe the superstitions of the church a block from his house: the gothic cathedral drooled lies and fear-mongering from its maw like the spit of their glands would hydrate the beggars on their knees outside the doors that they pretended didn't exist. The cemetery in the side lawn didn't hold Christian bones, but the bodies of those that those very bones let down. Three rows of three root stalks weren't gonna do shit at keeping Gerard away, but at least he thought they were funny. What neat little organized picket fence posts.

The man kept singing to himself, and Gerard kept giggling silently at the rosary hanging on a hook next to the front door that kept twirling and catching the television light. He doubted that he even knew the prayer, but he trusted that he'd already called a priest to complain, since there were little cross-shaped smudges on the window he was looking through with little water spots dripping from them. He'd already gotten his house blessed, and Gerard thought this was _also_ hilarious. If only he knew that the only thing that would stop a vampire with as much thirst as he had was a cold, hard stake to the heart and an eternal rest on the belly in a coffin sealed with a blessed gunshot.

Oh well, he was enchanting, regardless of how stupid he was.

He didn't do much else, still sitting wide and shifting his hips every now and then so that Gerard's heart jumped into his throat. It was like he was fully aware, a tease, taunting how far Gerard had to stay away and how hard he had to beg his fangs to stay retracted in the soft, squishy tissue. He was so fucking stupid, and Gerard just strained towards him. He was so drilled into his spot in the grass, leaning against the tree to keep from running to him and hold his libido under control, that he felt he was close to dislocating both of his hips at once and tearing every muscle in his body. He'd never felt anything like this before, for anyone, ever, but he loved it, so he didn't think much of it.

Gerard stood there, stiffly, until the man stood up from his chair, closing his legs, much to Gerard's dismay, and turned off the TV, so that he couldn't be seen anymore, retiring to bed at the ripe hour of 4:00 in the morning. Gerard could see the faint outline of him, just barely, and he dragged his feet across the floor as he rounded the corner to what must be his bedroom. He looked exhausted, but Gerard had never felt more awake in his entire life.

He was pretty sure that he skipped home, but he wasn't paying attention. He drew that conclusion because the second he walked back into the door of his house, Mikey and Ray were there to greet him.

"Someone had a good night." Ray smiled at him.

Gerard just slumped against the door onto the floor with the biggest sly grin on his face. "Jesus Christ, tell me about it."

"Tell _me_ about it." Ray crouched down in front of him, but only for a second, before he resorted to relaxing on his knees because the last position hurt his ankles.

"He's _hot."_ Gerard didn't even register that he was attracted to him, silly little fluttering flings of his heart like that happened every time he stalked a man, so it wasn't some _'holy shit'_ moment, but it definitely made the seduction part of feeds much more entertaining. Lust may as well be his middle name, if not entirely his calling. 

"Gerard, keep it in your pants, dude." Mikey called from across the room, somewhere in the kitchen. His roses had started to soak up the blood and the white petals were spattered with red.

"He was sitting like _this-"_ Gerard imitated the pose, sticking one leg out flat in front of him and pulling the other one out as far as he could, bending at the knee. "How can I?"

That was a genuine question. He hoped that someday he would get good enough to control himself around guys like that so he could have some composure and focus on observations, but the warm feeling in his chest made him feel giddy, so he was fine settling with being mediocre for now if it meant he could feel it more often.

 _"Ooo,_ Gerard has a crush!" Mikey drew out the last vowel, appearing around the corner and bounding into the room to sit on the couch to the right of the front door.

"No I don't." Gerard scoffed, waving his hand at Mikey. "I'm just hard for him, that's all. Loneliness doesn't help, okay?"

"Whoa, T.M.I., dude." Mikey grimaced. "You need a boyfriend."

 _"Hush."_ Gerard said, still giggling at how stupid he looked earlier. "He's growing garlic in his garden, there's a rosary hanging by the door, and he just got his house fucking blessed. He's trying his best, alright, and so am I."

"Oh, you're trying alright." Ray went to jokingly tap on Gerard's knee but decided he didn't exactly feel like touching him while he was sitting like that.

"Does he know that church on Valley road doesn't know shit about vampires?" Mikey locked his eyes on the wall across from him. There was still a chip taken out of the wood that took off the paint and exposed the raw, caramel colored paneling where the glass hit it the night before, and the tiny sliver of wax from the candle was stuck there.

"Apparently not, if he's walking down there and begging for a priest." Ray stood up and started to walk towards Mikey to sit next to him.

"I wish he'd beg for a lot more." Gerard said, smirking.

Ray and Mikey groaned in unison, rolling their eyes at him. "Do what you gotta do, man but- for the love of a non-existent God- stop talking."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	4. iv

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's that time of week again! i'm very very excited to share these next few chapters with you guys, they were really fun to write and i hope they make you as happy as they make me.
> 
> i have been completely swamped with school lately as finals are next week, so i haven't been able to write as much as i'd like to, but thankfully i have worked ahead and have enough content stored up to last through finals week. good move on my part, right?
> 
> anyways, enjoy this chapter. thankyou for all the love on this fic, it means more to me than you might think.
> 
> follow my other socials:  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

Gerard was sitting at the table again, twiddling his thumbs on the cold wood. He'd been seeing the guy with black hair for another week now, and each time it got funnier. "He got a fucking ladder, climbed onto his roof, and dumped a bag of _seeds_ on the shingles." Gerard could barely talk through his laughter. "What goes on in his brain?"

"Who's gonna tell him?" Ray pulled the laces tight on one of his shoes, finishing up the knot and sitting up straight again. 

"The church, obviously, he's the most gullible little chick I've ever heard of." Mikey was already standing by the front door, tipping onto his heels, back and forth, eager to see how full the moon was outside. His hearing was fantastic, so much so that he could hear their conversation from the other side of the house.

"Catholics…." Ray scoffed and he was trying to decide if it was cool enough outside to wear a coat, and decided against it. His jet black blazer would be enough. Midway through April was just fine.

 _"Christians."_ Gerard corrected him. "If he was Catholic he would have a clue of how to use a rosary. He's completely out of his league. I mean, he follows the priest around his own house like a scared puppy."

"Maybe he's not even a believer. If that's true, he's at least got _some_ sense." Ray met Mikey at the door and put his hand on his shoulder. He was doing that more often.

"Hopefully…" Gerard tapped his nails on the table.

"Are you sure you don't want to come, Gee?" Mikey called out, even though he knew he could hear his normal voice.

"I'm gonna go see our guy, remember?"

"Right, right. See you in a few, good luck." 

Ever since Gerard told the guys that he was going to try and get a closer look, they started sending him well wishes. It was something they always did when he was pursuing a new hunt, and a routine that Gerard always followed: slowly inching closer until he could watch from the kitchen. Invisibility spells worked wonders for this very purpose. He thought the myth that vampires couldn't enter places without being invited in first was hilarious. _How silly of you to think that my manners are that good!_

Gerard went and collected his own shoes, walking with a bit more glamor than he usually did, swaying his hips and smiling that pursed lip grin he always liked to slap on when he felt all smug and sly. If he was going to be all suave and conniving in his interest's house, he was going to keep that image up for the rest of his home life. He liked it. It made him feel powerful. Why wasn't he this confident all the time?

Gerard wasn't gonna lie, he was starting to feel odd about how much he pulled to this boy. He'd done a fairly okay job at convincing himself that it was just the refreshing rush of adrenaline that he always got from guys, and that he was just hungry, but something was still off. He had never felt this way this much before, how was he to know the difference? He was able to half-ignore the pounding in his chest as he walked the mile to the house, dizzy with delight at how every step brought him closer to him. 

Gerard had finally let Mikey put sunscreen on him at 2:00 in the morning, and so his skin was greasy and sticky and dry and it _crawled_ with impatience. He was going to be under the lights, better safe than sorry. He figured that after last week, he would let Mikey be nice to him. His anger felt more real, more fresh, and he finally felt like he could unwind a little bit. God, he hated having to keep his muscles so tense around the guys, so this was a nice contrast. It didn't necessarily fix anything, things were still the same, but at least the staircase was lit up and Gerard could see his next few steps. The total 180 shift in Mikey, though, made things a lot clearer. Gerard had no idea that it had been weighing on him so much. Sure, he knew how guilty and ashamed he was, he knew that he cried himself to sleep for months on end after it happened, so it wasn't like he thought everything was fine, but that was all he needed to get back to his usual self. Those four words were all Mikey needed to switch from his grieving, uneasy, heartbroken demeanor that he'd gotten more and more tired of expressing, to his excitable, chattering, happy-go-lucky self. Gerard realized how much he fucking missed that version of Mikey.

He strolled past the edge of the forest and hid behind the garden fence on the right side of the house. His heart was beating out of his chest, not with nervousness, but with pure fever. His bones were burning hot with how badly he wanted to be near him. His hands trembled, his stomach contorted, and he was itchy all over. He couldn't bear to wait another minute, but he had to take this as slow as possible.

Gerard leaned around the corner of the fence and checked the front window again, watching the shadows in the grass to see if there was any light from the TV or anywhere else. There wasn't. This was as dark as the house had been, especially this early. Looking in between the posts, every window was lightless. The neighborhood wasn't silent, there were trees rustling, conversations carrying, dogs whimpering, and doors creaking, so Gerard didn't have to be too careful. He was still going to be some degree of careful, of course.

Gerard gently eased the gate open, and what a well-oiled machine that was, because it smoothly and slowly glided open with the faintest touch, silently settling in a patch of dirt where the grass had worn away. He slid his body in, sniffing the scent of the fertile soil and the humid plants. He always loved the smell of garlic. He laughed to himself about the stupid myth.

As Gerard's hand reached for the doorknob, his heart was practically in his throat. He was in pain with how badly he wanted to see him. Again, an unsettling feeling, but one that he didn't mind getting used to. In immortality, it wasn't often that he'd feel so eternally happy. He let his fingers linger on the metal for a few seconds, absorbing the energy that was still left there, and wondering how many times his hands had touched that same spot. It was almost like he had his hands all over him, undeserving of this pathetic sense of intimacy. Sighing, he twisted it, and when the seal popped open he was hit with the smell of him: sage and cigarette smoke, warm bread and leather, like the most magical cordial of masculinity that Gerard had ever known. He envied it so much that it made him hurt even more. He pressed his lips together so he wouldn't cry out.

He eased himself in and left the door cracked. He turned to his left and rolled one of the beads on the rosary that was hanging there in between his fingers. A pretty thing, he thought, maybe someday he'd run out with it around his neck and show Ray and Mikey how lovely it looked against his blood stained chin. That would sure scare him.

The house was slightly warmer than Gerard kept his, the air was salty, but not fresh, but it wasn't stale yet, so Gerard made a mental note to leave before it got too languid in there. At this point, he was perfectly satisfied with where he was, and he didn't know if he even needed to see him at all. Just sucking on his spirit from right inside the garden door was overwhelming.

He wandered around a bit. The house was tiny, just as small as it looked from the outside, especially with all the clutter and jam-packed, unorganized shelves that filled every section of the combined kitchen and living room to the brim. Gerard liked it, though. It was home. He stood at the front window and watched the trees sway in the wind, scanning to try and find any yellow glowing eyes, but there were none. Tonight was a good night to be alive and out, why was this section of the world in hibernation? Tonight was his night, and if he had to make the most of it all by himself, that was going to have to be enough for him.

Gerard swore that the house was just too quiet. There was something wrong- no, there it was. He could hear his heartbeat from the living room, coming from somewhere around the corner behind him, presumably his bedroom. It was quick, but not too much, so it was unlikely that he was unsettled by hearing Gerard enter his house. So Gerard just stood with his eyes closed in the center of the room, listening to its rhythmic contraction, counting each tick as it went by: _one, two, one, two, one, two_ until he was sure his own heart would explode. He was just fine with this, it was as close as he had ever heard it and it made his head swirl. Gerard could picture it. He'd gotten him on his back and his hands were in his hair and maybe he was a little breathless. He could feel the nerves in his mouth alight with anticipation, waiting so impatiently with a starving stomach for that sinking feeling. That sinking feeling that he adored, the piercing of the flesh, the pop of the vein, the gasp, the leaking air, the- _fuck-_ the everything. It was intoxicating, better than any liquor or any drug would even dare to allude to. He didn't have to doubt for a second that biting this guy and sucking his hot, metallic, salty blood from the wound would be better than sex.

Gerard was preparing to take a look around, to pick things up and truly get closer to what made this person who he was. He was going to find all the little details that he couldn't see from outside and look at them up close. What made him tick? What made him glow with joy? What made him human? He turned around to leaf through the stack of magazines on the coffee table when he heard a single groan from the hallway. His heart turned to stone and the pulse in his ears grew a little faster. _Shit._

He started to make his way across the floor as quietly as possible to make his escape, but halfway through the room he heard it again, but more breathy and drawn out. He paused for a second, jerking his chin forward like that would help him hear better. Gerard stood there, bewildered, for a couple more rounds until a faint _"oooh, fuck-"_ came from the hallway and he damn near slapped himself in the face. Great timing, he thought.

It was like he was on auto-pilot. He drifted closer to where the racing heartbeat was coming from, stepping in time with the moans so that he was still noiseless like a wraith, until his ear was against the door. It made his stomach sick, he knew that he should've left a long time ago, or maybe he should've listened to Ray's advice to just wait it out another night, maybe back up into the trees to take it slower, since he was rushing into this rather quickly, but he couldn't tear himself away, not now. He was confined to this spot on the carpeted floor of the hallway, slouching slothily against the door, listening to the guy he's going to feed on jack off. 

His voice was low, but it pitched up every now and then, shiny like the steel of a pistol but smooth like a hardcover book. This boy was like silk and granite. He was a damn grenade too, and Gerard was holding the pin he'd just pulled from him. He held an explosive in his hand and he was going down with him.

He tried to keep his own wailing in his throat, sealing his lips like his life depended on it so that he could breathe through his nose. Gerard could taste blood in his mouth. He was either biting down on his tongue so hard that he'd cut it, or he was salivating so much, like a dog in heat, that he could imagine what he'd taste like. His belt was tight around his waist, he hadn't given himself the time on his walk over to adjust it as it'd been cutting into his soft hips all night, but it was especially uncomfortable now, so his memory returned to him. He let the buckle fly open and stuck his hand under the waistband. 

Gerard wasn't sure when he stopped breathing, but he knew that if he inhaled a single atom of oxygen he would scream. His head swarmed and his stomach hurt, but this was as alive as he'd felt in a very long time. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd slept with someone, or the last time he'd given himself a damn break, but this was like a glass of ice water after a summer walk. A swimming pool in August. The first wave of cold air conditioning. Relief. He let his head slowly roll back against the door.

His whole body shivered, his hands shook, his eyelids twitched from how tightly he shut them. It was so overwhelming that he felt like he was going to throw up. He was tense, his muscles twinged, exhausted from how much they were being exerted, and all Gerard could see behind his eyelids was white heat. It singed at his insides and he was numb all over, his nerves were severed at the dendrites and he wasn't even physically there. He lived inside his head now, and he was surrounded by the image of the bite: the gushing blood, the gushing of spit from his mouth, the longing for the taste. He was surrounded by the tender skin of his neck and the faded, gray ink injected underneath it. He was going to dream about it.

Then it all just went black. As quickly as it started, it was over, and Gerard opened his eyes to wavy, static vision. He was dizzy, drunk, and dumb. The moans on the other side of the door were still going, even louder and louder with each round, and his heart was beating so fast that Gerard couldn't count the thumps anymore. _How long does this guy last, Jesus Christ…_

He looked around for a second, and the tiny sliver of the rest of the house that he could see was in complete shambles. Furniture was tipped over and moved, books had been strewn all over the floor, and the shiny, red beaded rosary was laying perfectly straight on the floor right in the doorway to the hall. Gerard hurriedly wiped his hand on his pants and pulled them back to where they were originally sitting, and stood up, making his way to the door as fast as he could. Thankfully, the one thing he had done right tonight was make it swing open. As he stumbled through the kitchen, he tripped over a plain white coffee mug and came down on his knees on top of it, slashing the fabric of his pants on the glass and slicing his leg open. He reached for his shin to nurse it but he heard the man finish and move around a bit closer to the door, so he clambered to his feet again and ran as fast as he could with the discomfort in his pants and the throbbing pain in his leg, and didn't bother to shut the door. The gate was still open where he left it, and as he passed the threshold, he heard his bedroom door open, and he was shouting "what the fuck?" over and over again.

The farther Gerard got from the house, the wider the smile that spread across his face got, along with the agony in his knee. He finally felt the wetness trickling down his leg, his blood was hot and with each step a sticky drop hit his skin. He laughed hysterically as he tasted the acid and the salt in the back of his throat, pretty damn near upchucking and passing out. Oxytocin pumped through him, from the top of his head to the tips of his fingers to the tips of his toes- he couldn't slow down and he didn't want to. He hadn't had an orgasm in so long that he forgot that he mimics poltergeist activity, tossing things to and fro with his mind without even noticing a thing. _How evil of me,_ he thought, cawing into the night with laughter as he got closer to home, _how truly sinister. I wonder what he thinks is wrong now, I wonder what he thinks of me. I hope he heard me._

-

Gerard sat on the side of the tub, pressing a warm, wet washcloth on the cut in his leg. Mikey had already scrubbed all the glass out of it, which made Gerard cry in pain, so Mikey made him bite down on a towel so he wouldn't kick him. He still had the towel in his mouth, whimpering from the pain that was still shooting up to his hip.

He never got the chance to clean himself up, since Mikey screamed at the blood pouring down his brother's leg, so he shifted his weight uncomfortably against the porcelain. He would tell no one.

"Did he see you?" Mikey sounded like his mother, concern washing over the frustration in his voice that Gerard could still partly detect. 

If only he would have listened to Ray's advice, he wouldn't have to stay home for the next few days to wait for it to scab over, but at least the pleasure was worth it. At least he knows what the boy sounds like. He didn't expect to hear his voice at all that night, but he got more than he bargained for. More than he could have ever expected.

Gerard shook his head and let the towel drop from his teeth and into his lap. He finally caught his breath. "Got out just in time."

"You could have at least stopped after you rounded the street corner and asked for help, or- you know- called me or Ray, you got a shit ton of dirt in there. What was so worth sticking around for?"

Gerard swallowed and looked up at Ray, who was standing in the doorway. Gerard smiled. "His energy made me fucking drunk."

"Get a room, Gerard." Ray teased, leaning over Mikey's shoulder to look at how bad the injury was and laying yet another hand on his back. It wasn't that deep. "I'll go get the bandages, Mikey."

Gerard laughed to himself. He would love that.

He could still hear his moans in his ears, accompanied by the continuous sprinting of his heart, all sloshing together into one single burst of ventricle expulsion; so fast that each beat of his heart slurred into one. Gerard kept his hands folded on his lap on top of the towel.

"Oh, and did you forget that you can _literally_ go invisible like a ghost… or…" Mikey secured the safety pin on the fabric bandages that wrapped Gerard's leg just below his knee, and pulled the belt from the loops of Gerard's torn slacks. "These were your nice ones. I'm not dropping seventy bucks on another pair of these for you."

Gerard ignored his brother's whining on about his pants. "Goddamnit…" Gerard rolled his eyes. "He had me dazed, okay? You know how my memory is." 

"A shame." Mikey rolled the pants up and tossed them in the trash can behind him. 

He offered a hand to Gerard to help him up and he took it, still clutching the towel firmly to his hip, partly because when he would get hurt as a kid, he would hold onto whatever was nearest to him as a comfort, whether that be a wrinkled shirt from two weeks ago or a shampoo bottle, and partly because he just couldn't calm himself down and had already promised himself that he wouldn't talk about what just happened. It was his dirty little secret, and his attachment to anything material just happened to be enough to conceal it.

"Lay down, Gee, you need to sleep. We'll talk about tonight over coffee tomorrow, okay?" Mikey guided Gerard to his room and he noticed how heavy his eyelids were. 

It was still really early, only 3:47am, but he'd lost a lot of blood and the post-orgasmic exhaustion was setting in worse than it usually did. Of course, he really didn't have any reference to point to how bad it usually was before, but he hadn't been this tired in a very long time. That was enough to justify sleeping in the middle of the night. Oh, the joys of being nocturnal. 

Mikey gently laid Gerard down on his back in bed, elevating his leg with a pillow and flipping one of the blankets onto its short side so that his leg could be exposed to the air. "Is that okay?" Mikey cooed, brushing the hair out of Gerard's face. His eyes were already fluttering shut, and his lashes were still damp with tears.

"Mhm…" Gerard shut his eyes but didn't open them again, and the last thing he noticed before he did so was Mikey's loving gaze on him, and Ray, completely softened, staring with adoration at Mikey. If he wasn't so tired, he would have furrowed his brow and said something about how strange that was, but he was too weak to even nod, so he let himself fall asleep.

-

Gerard had completely forgotten about the way Ray looked at his brother when he woke up the next evening. Mikey was sitting on the other side of the bed, watching him. He hadn't left the room since last night.

"Good evening, princess." He jeered, softly poking Gerard's cheek with his finger.

Gerard looked up at him with a puffy face and blinked a few times before he cringed and strained his neck forward to look at the bandages. "Ah- fuck, my leg hurts."

Mikey jumped forward, crawling over the mattress to kneel at his side and slide his hand underneath Gerard's leg to lift it just a hair closer to his face. "You bled through the gauze- fuck, Gerard, do you have _any_ platelets inside you?"

"How am I supposed to know that? I got up to go to the bathroom and bumped it on the bathtub." He turned his head to the side and bit the sleeve of his shirt over his shoulder, anticipating pain, but there wasn't any.

Mikey sighed. "Of course you did."

Thankfully, he had slept with the towel hugged close to his chest, so Mikey took it, lifted his leg up, and spread it out on the sheets under it, so he could replace the bandages and dress the wound with some fresh gauze and antiseptic.

"You're like my bedside nurse." Gerard watched Mikey wipe the cut with a wad of tissues. He had brought all of his first aid things into the room with him and Gerard couldn't tell if this made him clever or overly paranoid. Either way, it came in handy.

"You're funny. You know that if I wasn't a vampire I'd totally be one." He pressed a thick stack of gauze to the wound and Gerard winced. "But drinking the blood of patients is discouraged in the medical industry." He chuckled a little, holding the compress down with one hand and pulling bandages from the roll that he held between his knees with the other.

The pain subsided little by little with every wrap of the fabric until it became a dull ache.

"I made these too tight last night, sorry, Gee." Mikey put his hand on Gerard's forehead.

"It's all your fault." He joked, playfully punching his thigh with the minimal strength he had in his tired stupor.

Mikey chuckled a little and smiled. "Yeah, I know. How awful of me."

Ray tapped on the door frame with his foot, and he was holding a tray of something with both hands. "Your caffeine, madame." He chimed and waited for Mikey to help Gerard sit up in bed.

He really didn't have to, he could do it just fine on his own, but Mikey was so set on doing as much as he could to help that Gerard felt bad refusing his efforts. He let him take his hand and pull on him if it made him feel more accomplished. Ray set the tray down on Gerard's lap, all it had was a mug of coffee on it, all the while looking at Mikey. 

He suddenly remembered the looks he'd given him the night before, but he felt like bringing that up would make him the ass of the house because- what was he supposed to answer to that? But when someone you've lived with for five years starts eyeing your brother, what are you supposed to do? He just stayed silent and took a sip of coffee. It warmed him up from the inside out.

Gerard usually felt awkward when both the guys were in his room, watching him, but he didn't this time, because Mikey and Ray were having a staring contest from opposite sides of Gerard's bed, and he didn't even notice, because he was so involved in how _just right_ they'd gotten his coffee. He finally felt refreshed in the evening, his mind was clear, his breathing was in a regular rhythm, and the uncomfortable stickiness in his boxers was resolved by a half asleep hobble to the bathroom with a new pair once he was sure Mikey was asleep next to him. That was the only miserable part, thankfully, save from the fact that he now had to stay home for the next couple of days so his leg could heal. Not that he was too keen on wreaking more havoc at the boy's house after what he'd done, but maybe he could bring Mikey and Ray to sit on the edge of the woods and watch him put his house back together through his front window, if they'd let him out of bed. He doubted that Mikey would let that slide. He reminisced on the memory as he let the steam waft into his face, cupping the mug with both hands and holding it close to his chest.

"Hey, Gerard, maybe in a couple days you and I could go get drinks or something, I want to talk to you… about something. We haven't done that in a while. I have a cane for you to borrow if your leg still hurts then."

Gerard nodded. "That sounds nice, Toro. Count on it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	5. v

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy vamp day!!! i hope this is something good to take your mind off of finals week like it is for me. i hope you all are well.
> 
> i'm very happy with this chapter, it's been feeling like the content so far has been filler-quality, which irks me, but i'm optimistic that this, now, will start to point to the direction i'm trying to lead in. what i'm trying to say is: things finally start happening now.
> 
> hoping you enjoy reading this as much as i enjoy writing it. :]
> 
> follow me !!! >~<  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

Gerard had been pacing, well, more like limping, around his room with the cane since yesterday, when Mikey finally let him out of bed by himself, and he was determined to get good enough at walking around so that he could go get drinks with Ray. His leg didn't hurt all that much, but the bruise was starting to spread up his knee in watercolor splotches of green and purple peeking just above the bandage making the bone tender. He walked from his bedroom door to his bed and leaned the cane against the footboard. He could do just fine without it now. 

Gerard stood there looking down at his feet, surveying the sheet white skin of his legs that contrasted his black boxers and crew socks so heavily. If it wasn't for his maple colored eyes, Gerard would look like a grayscale photograph from eras past. The beige cloth wrapped tightly around his left leg looked so dark compared to his skin.

Gerard pulled his door open and walked mindfully to the dining room where Ray and Mikey were sitting at the table, waiting for the coffee to brew as usual. He lowered himself into a chair next to Mikey, who patted his shoulder.

"How're you feeling?" He asked.

"Better. I can actually walk around now. It doesn't really hurt anymore." Gerard lifted his leg up a little bit, facing Mikey on his right side so that he could look at how loose the dressings were now that the swelling had started to go down.

"Good. I'll change your bandages one more time, it should be scabbed up by now, but you should still keep them on when you go out with Ray, or else it'll weep all over your pants. I don't want you ruining another pair of pants. Have some coffee first, though." Mikey stood up and poured him a mug, the first cup of the pot, and set it in front of him. It was so hot that Gerard could feel the heat radiating off of it.

"So," Ray started, shifting his body weight towards Gerard from the spot across from him that he always sat at. 

You'd think that with as long of a table with as many chairs as they had, they'd space themselves out, but they all always sat in the exact same spots and wore down the exact same chairs. One day, they promised, once those collapse under them, they'll switch them out. 

"Tell us about _him_. What was he doing that made you all clumsy? Spill."

Gerard smirked a little, hesitant. He knew he wasn't going to ever tell anyone his secret, so he had to come up with an elaborate lie on the spot. He wished he would have thought about this a little beforehand. "I didn't get to actually see him, but I did get to stand in his living room and look at all his things and _smell him,_ God, he's a tempting thing." He paused to sip his coffee. "His house is so full of him that it felt like I was touching him. Oh- and that rosary hanging by his door is so pretty. It would make a better necklace than a ward, useless thing."

"What color is it?" Mikey asked over his shoulder as he walked to Gerard's room to retrieve his pile of first aid things.

"Oxblood beads with a black medal and cross. Motherfucker thinks he's such a genius bringing home something so crimson like it'll keep me out."

"More like a lure." Ray chuckled, weaving his fingers. Gerard could hear the sound of his rough skin rubbing as he did so.

"Exactly."

"So… that's all? What else happened? That can't be all that went down, I mean, you tripped on glass and cut your leg open, what were you running from?" Mikey pulled the gauze pad back from the scabbed wound. He looked satisfied with the healing.

"Well," Gerard squeezed his thumbs in his fists. "I was in his kitchen and a mug fell, and while I was looking for it I tripped and landed on it. Obviously, he heard me so he was rustling around and I just booked it out of there." That wasn't entirely a lie, so he could keep his body language relatively authentic so that no one would catch on to him.

"Gerard, if you weren't so clumsy…" Mikey trailed off while he looked for the sticky end of the bandage on the roll, picking at it with his nails. He got it started and put a thin layer of gauze on top of Gerard's gnarly looking scab. "I mean, how many times have you cut yourself on glass? There was Toro's red tumblers, my vial, the fucking bathroom mirror, now this. Do you need a chaperone?"

Ray laughed. "Or a babysitter."

"Hey now-" Gerard cocked his head to the side, looking at Ray with wide eyes, still clenching his fists tight. "I'm the oldest, anyway."

"Act like it, then." Mikey poked Gerard's good knee, watching the little white mark that his fingernail left in his skin slowly fade.

"You're the one cooing at me like mom used to, Mikey."

Mikey sighed and peered up at Gerard, smiling with his lips sealed. "You're lucky that I do."

Gerard drank more of his coffee. "I always am."

Ray anxiously wrung his fingers out, trying his best to be present in the discussion. He bounced his leg for every second that went by. Once Mikey pinned the bandages and left to bring Gerard a pair of black jeans, he moved to the edge of his seat.

He only had one thing on his mind and it was weighing him down like an elephant on his chest. He couldn't sit still. Ray was so nervous to tell Gerard what he was thinking that he couldn't focus on anything. He was glad that Mikey and Gerard were only talking to each other at that moment.

Gerard tied his shoes and stood up, turning to Ray while he smoothed the wrinkles in his navy blue button-up shirt. "Are you ready to go?"

Ray nodded, standing up in a rush. He'd had his shoes on all evening.

"We're gonna go, Mikey." Gerard hugged him and adjusted the collar of his t-shirt. "We'll be back in a couple hours or something, I don't know what Ray has planned, but we'll be back soon, okay?"

"Okay." He murmured into a face full of Gerard's hair. "It's just after midnight on the fourteenth. Don't stay out past three."

"I won't, mom." Gerard pulled away and tucked a lock of hair behind his ear. "Love you."

"Love you, too."

Gerard and Ray walked silently down the front path leading from their house to the liquor store that Ray frequented, and Gerard felt it a touch unnerving to go the opposite way, away from the forest that he trudged through to go see his boy. He followed him, trying to think of something to say, but Ray stayed ahead of him, avoiding any awkward small talk until he could sit down on the cement around the back of the shop to have the conversation he invited Gerard to come with him to have. Ray fidgeted with the near empty box of cigarettes in his pocket. He only had one left and he was going to share it with Gerard, if he wanted it.

It was only four blocks away, so they got there pretty quickly, especially with Ray's long legs that Gerard had to walk a little faster to keep up with. Ray opened the door to the shop for Gerard, ushering him in ahead of him.

"Hey, Toro." The lady behind the counter waved at him. Ray waved back, still staying quiet.

He made a beeline for the cooler at the back of the store, glass doors reflecting the dizzying, flickering lights back into Gerard's eyes. He hadn't been anywhere this bright in a long time, so he tucked his hands into his pockets. Thank God he hadn't let Mikey cut his hair yet, because it covered just enough of the back of his neck.

Ray picked out the same plain old beer that he always bought, and Gerard stood there for a second, eyeing all the fruity flavors of spirit on display. He settled on a cherry wine, which made Ray smile. He'd been debating bringing a bottle of it home for him for a while, now he knew that he could next time he was out.

"Is this all for you boys?" The woman beamed at them, trying to hide the dark circles under her eyes from the late shift she was working. She had dark auburn hair and smokey eyes to match, dark red lipstick the exact shade as her regular long sleeve shirt and black jeans. She looked kind. "That'll be $15.30 even."

"Yeah, thanks Ruth." Ray pulled a twenty out of his wallet. "Keep the change." 

Of course her name was Ruth. Gerard liked that name.

She took the bill and pushed the bottles back at them. "Where's that brunette boy of yours?" She asked, looking at Ray with doe eyes. 

He gulped and smiled slightly, tipping back on his heels. "Oh- uh, he's at home. This is his brother, though."

She hummed and waved at Gerard. "Well, you two be safe, alright?"

"Alright, Ruth, take care." Ray strained at every word, picked up his drink, and walked away.

Ray was already out of the store by the time Gerard picked his drink back up off the counter. He tipped his head at Ruth and jogged after him.

Gerard was alone outside the store, peering around the corners on each side to look for Ray until he whistled at him. Gerard followed the sound around the back where it was pitch dark, and Ray was sitting on a plastic crate and had one pulled up next to him for Gerard to join him.

Gerard winced at the stretching of his skin under the bandage as he bent his knee to sit down, but he laid his leg out straight in front of him. He popped the cork out of his little bottle of cherry wine using his fang as a screw and sniffed it. 

Ray had already drank a quarter of his beer. "So," he started, with trembling hands. "I wanted to tell you something."

Gerard looked at him as he took a swig of the wine. It was delicious, he moaned as he took a bigger mouthful. "Yeah?"

Ray was breathing quickly, but he gulped and drank a little more to hide it and relax his nerves. "I don't know if you've noticed it, you probably have, so I look like an idiot right now, but- but uh…" He trailed off, trying to find the right words. He attempted to slow himself down because he couldn't just drink his entire beer in one go- how would he cope with the rest of the conversation? Ray just took deep breaths and held the glass bottle tight in his hands so that Gerard couldn't see them shake more than he already could.

"Are… you okay?" Gerard put his hand on Ray's arm, and he flinched a little bit. When he looked up at him, his tongue got stuck in his throat.

"I'm good, yeah- yeah I just… fuck, I don't know. It's stupid, really."

"No, it's not." Gerard took another drink. "Nothing you say is stupid, Ray, you know that."

"I know, I know, it's just, I noticed something the other day and- and I need to know how you feel about it, or else it's just gonna bother me forever." Ray sighed and shrugged his shoulders, taking another big gulp of alcohol.

"Slow down, Ray." Gerard lowered Ray's arm to his lap and set the bottle he was holding on the pavement. "Be careful."

He nodded. "Yeah, yeah, I know…" At this point, Ray was fighting back tears that he didn't know what to do with. He knew that he'd broken down when he was blackout drunk in front of the brothers before, and he was embarrassed about it, so anything he could do to keep that from happening again, he would happily oblige.

"Hey, it's okay." Gerard tucked one of Ray's curls behind his ear. "You don't have to tell me, we can just sit here and talk about something else if you're not ready."

"No, no, it's not that. I just don't want you to get mad at me." Ray hugged his shoulders to compensate for his empty hands.

"Why would I be mad at you?"

"I don't know, it's- it's dumb, I guess."

"I promise you, it's not. You can trust me, Ray. I won't make fun of you, or whatever you think I'm gonna do."

Ray paused and looked breathlessly at Gerard again, tearing his stare away from his lap and the fizz bubbling in his beer. He looked him dead in the eye and the fear stabbed him in the gut, he was sure that he was gonna throw up right there, but he never did. He just opened his mouth and forced the words out.

"I'm-... I'm in love with Mikey."

Gerard's jaw dropped open and he smiled. "What?" His voice pitched up at the end. "Oh my God, _that's_ why you look at him like he made the world!"

"Yeah, I guess." Ray forced a chuckle out, still nauseous, but somewhat relieved. "Look, if it's weird with you around, I- I get it but-"

"Ray, that's awesome!" Gerard put his bottle of wine on the concrete and turned towards him more. "I bet you a thousand percent that he likes you back."

Ray's stomach flipped. He hadn't even thought about whether Mikey would return his feelings, he just knew that he _had_ to tell someone or he was gonna go mad. "You think so?"

"I know so. Mikey's _so_ cool. What do you want to know about him? Oh, I have so many stories! Is- is that why you were always asking me to tell you about what he was like?"

Ray nodded.

"Oh my God, I'm dense. How did I not put that together?" Gerard put his hand on Ray's arm again. "He's gonna love this."

"Please don't tell him, I- I want to ask him out myself."

"No, doy, Ray, I wouldn't do that to you." Gerard reassured him and went on a tangent without even thinking. "He's the most lovable guy in the world, as sweet as candy, and, as you know," _Gesturing at his outstretched leg._ "He'll go out of his way to make sure you're cared for. He does get really down when he can't do things perfectly, though, so you just have to make sure that you love on him a little bit more. It's subtle enough that he won't really notice that you're doing it to make him feel better, but just enough to make him _actually_ feel better, you know?"

Ray's mouth was open. He felt so full of love, like the weight came off of him, like the elephant finally ran away to the circus. He loved listening to Gerard describe his brother, retelling all the patterns that he had just barely learned in the five years of living with him that Gerard had memorized over his whole life. 

"He's my best fucking friend and the strongest person I know. He's just like me but so much different at the same time, and I would do anything to make him happy. And I'm not gonna sit here and tell you the regular cheesy shit like _'we've had our ups and downs,'_ we've had our share of the worst type of conflict you can imagine, but he's still a part of me, and he always will be. Now, I have to share my little brother with the world and I'm excited for that to happen."

"So, it's not weird?" Ray picked up his beer again and took a small sip.

"Of course not. I'm glad you told me." Gerard leaned forward and hugged Ray, scooting his little red plastic crate closer to Ray's blue one.

Ray had no idea that he missed hugging Gerard so much. He wrapped his arms around him tight and just breathed there, letting his eyes close and relax. He felt so much better now, and instead of being dizzy with how vulnerable he felt and how nervous he was, he was beyond excited to see what was ahead. He was beyond excited to see Mikey.

"So, when do you want to tell him?" Gerard pulled away and put the cork back in his bottle.

"Umm... I know I won't be able to stay there with him without telling him for much longer, so… I don't know, maybe-"

"Tomorrow?" Gerard cut in. "It's gonna rain all night. Mikey loves the rain."

"Yeah, maybe." Ray looked at the tiny sliver that was left in his bottle and drank the rest of it.

"You could sit out on the porch, make hot tea, you could be all lovey-dovey, I'll stay out of your hair…" Gerard spoke in a sing-songy voice, curling the ends of his phrases up with the back of one of his hands under his chin.

"Shut up." Ray playfully punched Gerard's shoulder. "That sounds really nice."

"It's a date, then." 

"Yeah, it's a date." Ray couldn't help but smile. 

He could see Mikey there, in his mind, leaning against his shoulder, watching the rain pool up in the cracks of the pavement under the glow of the moon, sipping warm drinks and holding his hand. He could see how in love he was with him, and how much harder it was getting to hide it. He couldn't even hold off on going out of his way to touch him like he had been, sitting so he was always facing him, always rushing to his side when he was upset, always being everywhere Mikey was. This was the first time that he had gone anywhere without him there, next to him, in a long, long time. 

"Anything else on your mind, Ray? Or do you wanna go home and see Mikey now?"

"I wanna smoke a fucking cigarette… and then I wanna see Mikey."

"You got both."

Gerard and Ray sat there for a while, passing the smoke back and forth. Ray bounced his leg again, this time not out of fear, but with impatience. He had always been excited to see Mikey, but this new feeling that he had never felt so strongly before was the best firework display he'd ever seen, the most beautiful painting, an ethereal blade of light through rain clouds. He had no idea that speaking his affection out loud would be so liberating, and that Gerard would be so supportive. Surprises were so few and far between these days that Ray would chase it any chance he could.

"So, tell me," Gerard started. "What do you like most about Mikey? How long have you known?" He blew smoke out of the corner of his mouth and passed the cigarette back to Ray.

He thought a little, holding his breath to let the nicotine settle in his lungs. He exhaled and looked up at the dismal, starless sky. "You see that nasty brown glow?" Ray pointed up at the pollution where he was looking. "You know how it always makes me cough? I never do when I'm with him. He's like medicine, Gerard, he's like the fucking sun in the way that I revolve around him."

"He's your world, too." Gerard kept looking up at space, squinting his eyes to try and see more of the dim, gray speckles that were honestly sorry excuses for constellations. He wished they lived somewhere more remote so that industry didn't clog up their serenity.

Ray nodded, taking another deep puff of the cigarette. "I've known for as long as I've known him, I think. I just didn't have the words to describe it. I- I mean, I was completely alone when I moved in with you guys, that was the hardest time in my life, and he was just the one that was always there, no matter what. Mikey's just- he's... "

"The best thing that ever happened to you." Gerard interrupted again, sewing up the last bit of Ray's thought that he just wasn't sure how to articulate.

Ray was silent for a bit, taking in that what Gerard had just said was _exactly_ what he meant.

"Because he's the best thing that ever happened to me."

"Even though-"

"Yeah, even though he broke the only promise he'd ever made and turned me into the most grotesque, evil thing imaginable, something that I wouldn't wish on my worst fucking enemy, _still…_ " Gerard took a drag and let Ray have the last one that was left on the stubby little cigarette. " _Still,_ I wouldn't trade him for the universe and everything in it. I would throw myself into the sea wearing full lead armor before I let anyone near him that I wasn't sure would treat him like he's the king of the world. But you, Toro, I trust you. All you care about is loving any and everything you both can and cannot get your hands on, and that is the most admirable thing about you. Mikey loves you, no doubt about that, not even for a second. So, go home, go to sleep, and when you wake up in the evening, go love him back."

Ray just hugged Gerard. He knew that he wouldn't be able to organize any words for how much that meant to him, so he set his chin on his shoulder. Ray was so in love with Mikey that it hurt. He had fallen so deeply that every second that he wasn't with him was agonizing and made his chest hurt.

The two of them picked up their drinks and walked back to the house with the moon high in the sky. Gerard could feel the joy pulsing off of Ray, he was glowing a deep shade of gold because he had finally figured it out. He finally understood why his life up until this point felt so empty, so purposeless, so mundane: the missing piece was in plain view and all he had to do was place it in the hole that was left inside of him after five whole years of searching. Ray's entire life had been spent pulling towards a force he didn't recognize, like gravity, but deeper into the earth and more cosmic than anything he could fathom. Ray's heart was like a compass and the point had been spinning so radically in circles that it made him dizzy, but now it was pointing due north, and Mikey was the pole. All his life had been leading to him and this clarity, this understanding, was almost too much for Ray to handle. He was going to love him if it was the last thing he would do. He hadn't even told him yet, but he knew, far within him, that he was meant to love him forever. 

-

Gerard was walking fast, but carefully, down the narrow footpath of flattened grass that transected the patch of woods that jutted out into the lawn. He could smell his wood stove and hear every popping ember. He pictured him with an axe, swinging back and forth up and over his head and coming down _hard_ on a chunk of wood, splitting the fibers and sweating and grunting and- _Jesus…_

Gerard could picture his muscles flexing, his body twisting, his brow furrowing, his breathing heavy… 

He swallowed a lump in his throat and kept moving. He peered over his shoulder at Mikey and Ray who were following a few paces behind him. Ray had his hands stuffed in his pockets and Gerard couldn't tell if the flush across his cheeks was from walking directly into an abnormally biting wind or from the amount of times Mikey's shoulder brushed against the side of his arm. He smiled a bit to himself.

"So, here's where I usually stay." Gerard came to a stop behind the oak tree that he leaned on every night for over a week till he got bored of the distance. "We could stay here or do a spell, go incognito, and go in his kitchen."

"I wanna go in." Mikey shook both of his fists around his shoulders, trying to keep his body moving as much as he could in the cold.

Ray acknowledged this but didn't say anything, he nodded and stared intently at the side of Mikey's face, admiring the straight spikes of hair sticking out of his beanie.

"Cool. We've been over this, you guys know how to do it, whatever." Gerard shut his eyes and when he opened them again, Mikey and Ray were slightly translucent. Not sheer like cartoon ghosts with cheesy green glows, but mildly muddled, like paintings or the view through a wet piece of paper. The process was numbing, Gerard always lost track of what it felt like or how he even did it in the first place. He didn't use it often, but when he did it was like he was asleep the whole time. It really didn't take much thought, but it always made his head spin no matter how many times he did it, stopping constantly to rub his eyes to make sure his brother was still by his side in case he blended in with the oil around them. Gerard looked down at his hands and his feet and it looked like he was underwater, but in the clearest pool he could imagine. It was calming but slightly nerve wracking to see yourself so vividly but so blurrily at the same time. Invisibility was not Gerard's favorite power in his skill set, but it made life easier when it came to pretty black-haired boys' kitchen tables.

Gerard slid one of Mikey's fingers into his fist and turned around to make sure that Ray was following close. He was. "Okay, in we go." 

It felt strange walking so nonchalantly down the middle of the lawn in the pitch black night, the moon rising high in the sky and illuminating each individual leaf of every tree. Gerard wondered if this man had ever cut one down to make a stake while his superstition buried him alive. He didn't see any branches out of place since the last time he was through here, so he let some of his breath out that he'd been holding in. He was doubtful that the church would tell him anything about how to do that at all. He doubted that the church could do anything right. 

Gerard had only done it once, but he pushed the garden gate open like it was a reflex. He slithered inside and rested his hand on the door knob again. Just like last time, he could feel the texture of the grease his hands had left behind, and he was all over him again. He wanted to let go and let Mikey and Ray take turns absorbing him, but he couldn't pull himself away. He couldn't share him, which was another nervous realization that unsettled him. Since when was he this selfish over his feeds? Instead, Gerard gently eased the seals on the door, and when they popped open, he was hit in the face by the smell of him. Thank God silence was a key feature in this power, because he let out a long hum as he stood in the open space. Thank God he couldn't hear anything.

The three of them stepped inside, shut the door, and sat around the table between the kitchen and the garden door in the cramped room. The living room was to their left, hallway to their right. The rosary had been restored to its place on the nail in the wall a centimeter from the door frame. The furniture was exactly how it was before Gerard had roused it, and the house was dark, save for the TV that had been left on.

"He'll be back in any second-" Gerard got cut off by the man himself squeezing between the pulled out chair that Gerard was sitting in and the kitchen counter. He held his breath, even though he couldn't see him, hear him, or even feel him. He carried on his time as normal and sat down with a sigh on the armchair in front of the screen.

 _"Oooo…"_ Mikey raised his eyebrows and looked up at Gerard with pursed lips. "I get it."

"Right?" Gerard leaned back in the chair and tilted his head to the side to get a better view. "He's gorgeous."

"You've never seen him this close, have you?" Ray took such a deep look at the man that Gerard felt a spike rush through him. It was like he was stealing him all for himself. "He looks like he just _oozes_ glucose."

Gerard shook his head. "Yeah." He got distracted by a pile of polaroids on the table in front of him. He picked one up, studying it, trying to distract himself from the waviness of his skin. It was an equally blurry, grainy photo of him with the widest smile on his face. He looked intoxicatingly happy and Gerard envied it. He missed that part of himself. Maybe this guy had that missing piece, and maybe he would let him steal it, running off into the night, laughing until his ribs broke. Maybe he would let him take the joy from his eyes that made him so jealous that it stung. Gerard was gonna suck every last molecule of dopamine from his veins if it was the last meal he'd ever have.

"He sits like the devil-" Ray observed, pointing at the man's left leg that was draped over the arm of the chair, angling him towards them, just feet away. 

Gerard ached. How easy it would be to just unravel the knot inside his mind and make himself visible, straddle him and feel his hips shift and grind underneath him, kiss his stupid, soft mouth and taste how warm he kept things. How easy it would be to just pin him onto his back and sink his razor sharp teeth into his supple flesh…

"Gerard." Ray was sitting right next to him, between him and Mikey, and he was tapping his fingers together in front of his face. "You're drooling, man, how shitty was that last feed that you're getting off to him just _sitting_ there."

"Shut up, you have no idea." Gerard pretended to rest his chin on the heel of his hand, but he was really wiping the spit from his lip. He was _beautiful._

Then, something funny must have come across the TV set, because the man laughed, and Gerard felt a piece of his soul break off and gravitate towards him. His hair fell over his eyes and he flipped it back with a snap of his neck, exposing his sharpened brow bone and long eyelashes. His laugh just reeked of pot and cigarette coughs. It was crisp and deep in his throat, and Gerard felt like a smudge compared to the cutting tone of his voice.

Gerard knew that the others had said something to him, but he felt himself disappearing more and more into the seams of reality where the space between the fabric and the void roared with atmospheric wind. He knew that they were making fun of how close to the core of the Earth he'd dug himself, but he didn't care. He could feel the nip of the gusts blowing his awkward bangs back out of his face, and the artificial heaven-white light from the television screen cast his shadow just inches from his hand. Gerard squirmed in his seat and prodded at the darkness with his fingers. He could almost feel his skin and his silky, dark hair. This wasn't some frantic turned on desperation, it was one fueled by awe, and one that Gerard couldn't quite place. Actually, he knew what it was, he knew the exact word right down to the spelling, but-

Oh.

Oh _shit._

"Guys- guys, we should go." Gerard moved to get up from the chair, still letting his palm stick flat on top of the polaroid he'd been holding in his hand for the past few minutes.

"Dude, we've only been here for like five minutes, it's only two." Mikey furrowed his eyebrows at his brother, wearing a concerned look on his face. "Is something wrong?" 

"I- I don't feel good, I need to get some air, come on-"

"Gerard." Ray firmly took hold of Gerard's wrist, pulling him down to sit again. "You're fine, you're just overwhelmed, okay? I promise you're alright."

"No, no," He tried to fight Ray's grip but to no avail. "No, I feel like I'm having a heart attack, _fuck,_ what's wrong with me?"

 _"Nothing."_ Ray forced him to sit again and rubbed circles in his back. "You're panicking because there's no goddamn air in here. Can't you telepathically make him open a fucking window or something?"

Gerard groaned and pressed his hand into his chest. "I don't know." He peeled his eyes away from the man and put his head in his hands, shutting his eyes. It helped a little bit, but the energy of the house was still overtaking him, swimming all around him and over his head, taking him down farther and farther towards the bottom with a wicked current. He swore under his breath and strained with how hard his knuckles pressed into his closed eyes. 

"Something's just- something's just off. I- I don't know what it is."

"It's okay, man, he _is_ magical, you're not the only one being moved right now."

 _He's mine,_ Gerard wanted to snap back, but he held the growl in his throat. The possessiveness swarmed in one ear and out the other, rotting his brain down to the white matter and stealing away precious neurons. This man was making him stupid with how much he was hurting him.

Maybe he was in on energy work, maybe he knew exactly what his dumb ass was doing, twitching in place and sitting so wide and engulfing Gerard in the grasp of the thick, hardy bone of his pelvis. Maybe he was completely aware of the presence in the room with him, twisting his fingers ever so slightly to slowly drain the life from Gerard's body, sucking his soul right out of his mouth like an evil French kiss.

 _Leave me alone with him._ Gerard wanted to say it so badly that it made his stomach sick. He bit his tongue and bounced his leg to try and stay afloat. He was _starving,_ ravenous with the want, with the need, and his fangs extended down to stab the soft tissue of his mouth. He flinched at the sudden pain and focused all his might to try and get them to retract, but they wouldn't budge. This was only made worse by the guy leaning his head on the cushioned headrest of the armchair, exposing the heavily tattooed side of his neck. Gerard shut his mouth as tightly as he could, locking his tongue inside with an airtight seal so that he wouldn't pant and drool like a dog all over the table.

That same realization from earlier came back when he laughed again.

Oh.

Oh _shit._ Oh _no…_

"Gerard, can you hear us? Are you okay? Do you need some air?" Mikey and Ray's voices blended together into one and Gerard let his whole body relax against the chair. His jaw creaked open. His fingers curled into soft fists and his heart rose into his throat so that he could taste iron embedding itself in every one of his teeth. Relief washed over him and he felt the same clarity that he felt the last time he was here, disheveled and exhausted, but as happy as can be.

"Gee?" Mikey stood up and massaged his shoulders, stooping down to rub his face in his hair.

Gerard sat there, staring at the man and his stupid piercings and his stupid tattoos and his stupid face and his stupid body. Gerard was stupid with it. He nodded and reached back to catch one of Mikey's hands and squeezed it a couple times before letting it drop back onto his shoulder. Mikey thumbed the tender, damaged muscles in the corner of his neck.

"Hello?" Ray's voice had a hint of snark in it.

Gerard shifted so that his whole body was facing him, still sitting and intermittently laughing and grinning at the TV screen he was glued to. Gerard let his legs fall open wide as the last of his tense muscles relaxed. He sank into the hard, wooden chair until the back of his head rested on the backing. He smiled so much that he glowed. "I _like_ him."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	6. vi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know what time it is !!! vamp day !
> 
> thankyou all for the love lately, i've gotten such wonderful comments on both of my fics and you guys have no idea how much things like that fuel me to keep going. comments mean so so much :]
> 
> my first semester of my senior year of high school is finally over and i'm exhausted!! but i finally have the breathing room to do whatever i want and relax for a few weeks, which is exactly what i've been needing. i hope you all are doing well.
> 
> enough of my rambling!!! you came here for vampires and so you're going to get vampires!!!
> 
> follow me!!!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

The rain was coming down hard.

"It wasn't supposed to happen like that." Gerard downed the last swig of blood-rum from one of Ray's crystal glasses. "I didn't mean to-" 

"Gee," Ray started, tilting his head to the side as he stared intently at how tightly- or not tightly enough- Gerard held the cup. He always got nervous when other people handled his things, for obvious reasons. "It's not your fault, man, I know you can't help it, but you can't just _fall in love_ with your feeds. That's not gonna go well."

"You still want to feed on him, don't you? You're not just gonna throw away all the work you've done, are you? I mean, we all still have to eat, he's all of ours just as much as he is yours." Mikey was sitting a little closer to Ray than he usually did, but he didn't move. He didn't seem to notice that Ray had plopped down on the living room floor directly next to him, so much so that his bent knee dug into his own. 

_He's mine,_ Gerard wanted to yell this as loud as he could, slinging spit from his blade-like teeth and wicked, swollen gums, snarling and gnashing and pushing everyone away. He felt an overwhelming territorial ownership and a guttural, visceral protection over this boy, wanting so badly and so deeply to shut him up and away in his own private little heaven where no one else would ever find him. He wanted to hold him tight to his chest, purr over his sleeping body, and kiss the top of his soft head of hair before he ripped into his delicate skin and drank his life straight from him. Gerard wanted him so bad and he wasn't going to stop until the heartache was tamed. 

"Look, you either need to get over yourself and shove those feelings to the back of your mind, or-" 

"Or what, Mikey?" Gerard could feel the tugging of the muscles in the roof of his mouth, fangs twitching in his heart's exertion's warmth. It was getting harder and harder to deny that he thought he was the only one who deserved him. 

"Gerard." Mikey leaned toward him, sucking his lips into his mouth and widening his eyes behind the glasses that he finally caved and started wearing again. He lingered here for a bit, watching his brother and trying to pry into his mind. "Or you have to give him up and start over."

Gerard whined, sinking into himself and staring blankly at his lap. 

"I know you don't want either of those, okay? I know you love the seduction part, and he makes you feel the lustre, but there comes a point when your heart pumps too much blood to your head and your dick and you have to wipe it away from the windshield so you can see the road you're driving on, you know? He's mortal. He's _human._ You just- we're doing this to survive, you're turning this into a sport, chasing him like a rabbit. From the looks of you, I would guess that you don't even intend to share him with us once you get him." Ray didn't even look at anyone while he talked, but he let his elbow rest on his thigh, palm upturned, with all his fingers pointing at Mikey. 

Gerard could see how hungry Ray was, still, even after as satisfactory of a feed as he had two weeks ago: his skin was just as gray as it always was, but his veins were a dark purple, their usual teal had faded and stolen its hue from the thunderous night sky. He knew that he had no other choice, he couldn't just let his friend and his _brother_ starve, but he couldn't let himself pass the blockade inside of him to just share his boy. 

"Maybe I could just-" 

"Turn him, Gerard? Really?" Ray snapped at him, letting his fingertips hit the floor as he relaxed his entire arm. 

"That's not what I was gonna say-"

"Yes, it was." Mikey shifted his weight on the wooden floor slightly, fight or flight instinct kicking in. Ray set his hand on his thigh to steady him, and Mikey peered up at him, distracted for a second. He wanted to get up and storm off, walking just fast enough so that he didn't have time to shoo Ray from chasing after him. He always did that so that he would follow him to his room. 

"I don't want him to feel the way I do. That's why I said that it wasn't supposed to go this way."

"Then what do we do?" Ray let go of Mikey's leg and Mikey looked disappointed. Ray rubbed his temples and pushed the tips of his fingers into his hairline. He pulled a lock of curls and twisted it.

"It's just-" Gerard started, straightening his posture unknowingly and powering up like the flame in a kerosene lamp once it catches the first drop of fuel. "After all this time, I finally feel like I deserve something good, like I finally deserve love, and- and now he has to be taken away from me."

"I didn't say that." Mikey scooted across the circle to kneel in front of Gerard and Ray felt cold, but he kept his eyes glued to his back. "You have always deserved love. I didn't mean you have to get rid of him altogether, I'm just saying that you have to choose between instinct and itch. You know that you're gonna have to scratch the hive eventually, I'm not denying you your pleasure, but you should know by now that digging your nails into a patch they shouldn't be will only infect the wound."

Gerard sighed and looked over Mikey's shoulder at Ray, whose eyes looked so joyous, so full of yearning, and desirous, that it made him somber. If everyone else around him could fall in love, he could too, he figured. He wanted to hiss at him. To growl at his lovely face, to make it known that if anything, he deserved to feel that feeling just as much. It was a game of counting down the minutes until Ray pulled Mikey aside and told him the total of his thoughts and Gerard was the lone supernova in an ever-expanding universe full of new stars.

Sure, he _was_ happy for them, obviously, but jealousy was a rotten, low-hanging fruit that Gerard just couldn't resist plucking off and indulging in. That was one of his traits that he just despised: he couldn't let one be one without adding more to the equation so that his math was never straight. Once he got that final piece, however, he promised to let it all go and cancel out. It would never really equal zero, though, since Gerard was convinced that nothing in his eternal life would ever be perfect.

"Where are you going?" Mikey caught Gerard's hand the second he planted it on the floor to stand up and leave. He hadn't even thought about where he'd go, his brain was just programmed to drift over that mile and fix his roots to the ground of the forest walls.

"Nowhere." Gerard let his body weight settle once again.

"He's a nice boy, Gee." Mikey exhaled, still sitting in front of him and bending his fingers back in his lap. "I just don't think that loving him is right for you."

"Why not?" Gerard didn't raise his voice or his eyes, but he felt how sharp his tone was in the space between his sixth and seventh ribs. His breath shook as he tried to calm himself down.

Mikey didn't answer.

"We've been doing this shit the same exact way for five fucking years. Why not change it all now?"

"Because it's been _working_ for five fucking years! Why else do you think we've been able to keep ourselves safe for this long?" Mikey rolled off of his knees and sat with them pulled up to his chest. "You can _not_ let this get to your head."

"It's _not_ in my head, I genuinely like him-"

"I know!" Mikey let his forehead fall to meet his knees and wrapped his arms around them. "I know you do. I want you to be happy, damn it, you know I do, with all my heart, but I can't-... I can't let you get hurt, Gerard, what if something happens to you? You don't know anything about him, what if he knows exactly what he's doing?"

"He doesn't. You saw it yourselves, he's clueless."

"But what if he figures it out? All it takes is one little tip and you're laying in the dirt staked through the heart. Do you think I'm gonna ever forgive myself if I take that risk? Do you think I'd ever let anything happen to you? Do you think I'm gonna let something happen to the only person who's ever loved me?"

Gerard picked at the nail on his pinky finger. He knew Mikey was right, but the biggest sector of his brain just refused to let go; neither of the guys could wrestle that man with black hair from his cold, veiny, pale hands, not even over his dead fucking corpse.

Gerard could hear the faint pitter-patter of Ray's heart at the last question Mikey asked. He could tell that he was inches away from pulling Mikey onto his back and never letting go of him.

But it was true. Gerard _was_ the only person who had ever loved Mikey this much, people had come and gone, family had slowly distanced themselves from him until they were nothing but a faraway memory, friends had stopped replying, and superstition got the best of everyone the Ways had ever known. It was lonely out there in the little Victorian house on the outskirts of the city, and Gerard had dedicated his entire life's purpose to making sure Mikey felt safe and adored like he deserved to. It was bittersweet being the sole reason that someone was kept in one piece, and it came with a switchboard of the same taste. This board only had two buttons: one, conserve your life forever and keep yourself in the shadows to protect those you love, which was, honestly, restless as all hell and worse than its flames, and two, exist viciously forever and put your soul and everyone else's at risk so you can see all that the world has to offer before you outlive it, which raised tension and made for sickening fights over who was actually living and who was simply surviving just to get by. Neither of the options programmed into Pandora's Box led to anything of equal justification, as you can tell.

"I wanna just- what if I just met him, face to face, and then go from there?"

Mikey scrunched up his nose. He really didn't like the idea of letting him get any closer, since it had already ended almost badly before, but he knew that he would never let it go if he didn't at least try and consider it. Gerard would fall into a pit of misery and heartbreak like he always did when he lost sight of a prospective guy, and the last time that had happened it was more gruesome than healing, so Mikey figured that he would spare him, and everyone else in the house, from that recurrence, especially if this new one had pulled him far into the caverns so suddenly that the bond would be impossible to snap. He mulled it over in his head, looked Gerard in the eye, and sighed. "Fine. As long as we're all there, or at least me, just out of sight, it should be alright. I don't want you to go alone."

Gerard didn't embrace him and thank him and tell him how relieved he was, but he showed it in the way that his shoulders relaxed and he stopped picking at his skin.

Mikey backed up and sat back down next to Ray, just as close as they were before. He looked up at him, rapt into his eyes, and smirked a little, before leaning his head on his shoulder. Ray looked like a struck match.

Gerard was sitting with his legs crossed and gently rubbed the side of his index finger with his thumb. He kept picturing what meeting that boy would be like, what his speaking voice would sound like, how he would react to him, oh, so many ways it could go and so many things could happen, but Gerard didn't stay too long on the negatives. Mikey would do all the worrying for him.

He watched Ray touch Mikey's arm with a slight tremble in his fingers, and whisper something in his ear. They stood up and walked out onto the porch in silence. Gerard didn't notice that they'd even left.

-

  
  


"So, there's something I wanna tell you." Ray finally spoke after gritting his teeth over the chill of the spring rain. It had let up just enough so that they could hear each other speak, and Ray took a sip of his chamomile tea that warmed him up from the inside out.

Ray tried to find his solace in the vibrations of the rain, but none would come. His head was just barely above the surge, so he was inhaling mouthfuls, but the water was cool and it filled in all the empty space. Ray was sure he could taste him there, too, and his eyes fluttered shut at the connection between the leaves in his teabag and the scent coming off of Mikey. The mug melted the ice inside of his gelid cavities, and the vaporized clouds of their lungs fused together to encase them in a bubble of opposing climates. Yeah, that sounded right: Mikey was hot chamomile tea, both in the way he calmed Ray down until he wasn't sure his heart would have the stamina to beat, and in the way that he burned the back of his throat all the way down to his stomach. It also sounded right that having Mikey just sit there and breathe was warming him up and remedying his scalded organs. He was the cause and the effect, the illness and the cure, the patch and the salve, and Ray wanted to be sick forever so that he could always bathe in Mikey's milk and honey serum. Heal and be healed again, eternally rejuvenated and eternally reborn. Holding this back was an anvil on his ribs.

"Hmm?" Mikey was sitting close to him again, absorbing his body heat and listening to the softness of Ray's voice.

He looked like an angel in the darkness of the clouds, of the night, and, to be fair, he looked like an angel all the time to Ray, but tonight, the moon poked through in little freckles of gray that made him glow. Ray was sure every lunar goddess was pointing to him and all his fucking glorious light.

"I uh…" He hesitated a little, heartbeat quickening at the proximity between them, but when he looked up from the steaming mug in his hands to Mikey's eyes, which were just as much, it felt like each raindrop fell in slow motion.

Mikey had some kind of way of liquefying time. It only solidified the fact that he was the anecdote to impatience and the butter balm to soothe reluctance; cold water to a burn, aspirin to a heartache, ginger to an upset gut. The longer the clock was frozen, the easier Ray felt that he could push its hands onward. The wait wasn't so poisonous anymore.

"Mikey," He started, taking his free hand in his own and turning Mikey's palm up towards the crying clouds so he could catch the drops. "Do you feel that?"

"What? The rain?" He hummed, with a smile, fingers twitching at the cool temperature of the water against his skin.

"Yeah, the rain. You know how- it's freezing, it wakes you up, doesn't it? It makes you wanna move, get out in the world, dance in it, and then huddle around a fire so that nothing in the world you've just let yourself into will ever hurt you, right?" Ray traced a drop of rain that trailed down Mikey's wrist with one of his fingers, following it along a puffy vein until it disappeared under his black sleeve. The drop reflected the moonlight just right, he thought. He was just right.

"Yes… what are you saying?" Mikey drank some more tea, still maintaining eye contact.

"I'm saying… that's how you make me feel. You make me feel like the rain, like I can go out into whatever this place is, dance, let my heart be free. You're also the fire that I curl around, that I fight my way closest to, you make me feel like nothing in this world can ever hurt me."

"Ray-"

"Mikey, I'm in love with you." Ray cut him off. 

He wanted to say so much more, he wanted everything inside of him to pour out like the storm, crack like the thunder he was waiting so anxiously for, and illuminate the entire expanse of nothingness inside of him like a lightning strike so he can set his glacier ablaze, thawing out the frigid land. He thought he did a pretty good job, though, he blurted out the only thing that was on his mind and kept it simple, and he felt like the two of their voices were the only sounds in the universe that mattered. Not the deafening, blaring on of black holes and gigantic planets, not the screaming of nebulae, not the roar of the engines of shuttles past, nothing. Just Ray's voice and Mikey's voice, together against the world, everything in it, and everything that would ever exist beyond it.

Mikey's lip quivered in the cold and so he leaned in closer to Ray, resting his chin on his shoulder so he could bury his face in his warm hair. He pitched his chin up slightly and spoke softly into Ray's ear: "I'm in love with you, too."

Ray felt swollen. He felt whole. He felt just like he said he did, like he was inches from a roaring, raging inferno, but nothing could ever come close to singeing a single hair on his body. The fact that he hadn't even thought about what Mikey had just said- if he would ever even think that- gave him a sensation that he couldn't put a name to. It was relieving, of course, to know that at least it wouldn't be awkward around the house, but hearing the words that he had just expelled return to him was unbelievable. _'I'm in love with you, too.'_ Ray chewed on the sentence inside his mind, repeating exactly what Mikey sounded like when he said it. Each word was like a ripe berry: sugary, sickly, just perfect. He was just perfect.

"It's cold." Mikey whispered, arm still outstretched beyond the awning, collecting rain in the deep valleys of the wrinkles in his hand. His nails had turned purple, but he didn't take his hand out of Ray's. He stayed right where he was, content with the touch, the contact kept him warm, somehow.

Ray pulled his hand back towards him, pressing his palm against his hot mug of tea so that he could take the frostbite away. He kept his own hand on the back of Mikey's. The water ran down their arms and soaked their sleeves, but that wasn't a concern for either of them. Ray lifted Mikey's hand to touch the side of his face, webbing hooked under his ear. The contrast in temperature startled him, but he didn't move away, he just stared at his amber eyes for a second.

They were rich like sap, sweet like syrup, and the only thing that was keeping Ray grounded. The rain was numbing, and the wind was picking up a bit, God, he hated how the first leg of the spring was always too cold, it was more like winter plus a quarter and change, but Ray was perfectly content with the only thing he could feel being Mikey against his body. He was perfectly content with that being the only thing he could ever feel for the rest of his life. If everything got taken away except for Mikey, that would be more than enough for him.

They sat there in the rain, staring into each other's eyes, for what felt like a few seconds, but it was actually close to an hour, just studying every inch of each other that they could see. As the night crawled on, and the temperature plummeted at the same rate, they bundled closer together.

Ray never noticed the streak of dark brown in Mikey's right eye before this, his dilated pupils made it a little hard to see, so he moved in closer and closer until Mikey pulled him in that last inch and half, with his hand that had finally dried and begun to warm, and kissed him.

-

"I told him." Ray sat on the edge of Gerard's bed, fidgeting with the corner of the red fitted sheet that wasn't pulled tight enough.

"I figured as much, you two were out there for a long ass time." Gerard scanned the first few pages of a book before he lost interest and set it down on his bedside table. Mikey had suggested it, it was one that he had given him on one of his outings that he really enjoyed. He figured that he needed to set his mind on something other than his mushy crush.

"It was just an hour…" Ray droned, rolling his eyes. "We kissed."

"Aww." Gerard fawned, rolling his head to the right. "I told you he loved you."

"Yeah," Ray smiled and rubbed his hands together in his lap, trying still to warm them. "I really like him."

"I'm glad. I'm glad that you have each other." _I just wish I had someone._ Gerard wanted to add on to that, but he knew that Ray would toss something sentimental into the pot like _'Oh, but I'm sure you'll find someone'_ like he always did. Gerard didn't want to hear that, as earnest as Ray meant it all in good faith, but he was convinced that he already did. 

Gerard was sly; he was assured that, given time, he would find a loophole to slither through like the first evil serpent of Genesis and get everything he wanted.

"So am I. He's everything- but- but I'm sure you don't wanna hear me gush all over the place."

"No, no it's fine, you can, I'm just-"

"Stressed?"

Gerard bunched his eyebrows up together. "Yeah, how-"

"You haven't stopped tapping your fingers together since I came in here, you've been curled up in a ball all night, and you won't even look at me. Gerard, I don't have psychic powers, you're just an open book."

Gerard huffed, trying to think of ways he could relax without it seeming obvious that he had been wallowing in it up until this point. His back ached from the arch he had it in.

"I know that your liking that guy doesn't put a good taste in Mikey's mouth, he's protective of you, obviously, but in my opinion, I kinda see where you're coming from when you say things have been the same for five years."

"Thank you." Gerard shook his head, letting his hand rise and fall, slapping onto his thigh. "I try to understand what he's saying, and I know he's just trying to fill in what dad didn't do very well, but… sometimes, I have to be my own person, you know?"

"I know." Ray looked over his shoulder at the empty doorway and the empty hall. Everything was empty without Mikey in it.

"This is the first time I've ever liked _anyone_ in nearly ten years, I haven't had a proper boyfriend since I was fifteen, and that only lasted a month or two. I want him so bad, Ray Toro, he's all I can think about." Gerard dug his knuckles into his palm.

"I can see that. If it makes you feel any better, or if it makes _Mikey_ feel any better, I'll come along when you meet the guy tomorrow, we'll stay far enough back so that it doesn't look like you brought chaperones along to a first date."

"First impressions." Gerard chuckled.

Ray playfully clutched Gerard's shin, squeezed it before he got up, and practically skipped down the hall to see whatever Mikey was up to, even though he'd only been out of his sight for less than three minutes.

 _Tomorrow…_ Gerard repeated, picturing him again, _tomorrow._ Tomorrow he would look into his eyes and understand what made him so special, and he would make everyone else understand it, too. No longer would he be the laughing stock on the way to the gallows, he was going to show off how incredible he already knew he was, and he would make them understand that this short man with black hair, tattoos, piercings, and a problem with trusting too quick was the only thing he deserved to keep all for himself, or even that he deserved at all.

Gerard couldn't stop thinking about it now. He couldn't stop thinking about how he sounded just four days ago, breathy and desperate and _hot_ like he burned his insides. He couldn't stop wondering what his body would look like up close when it was intentional, what his voice would sound like, unfiltered and unfettered in his ears, and how glorious touching him to shake his hand would be. Gerard prayed that he could control himself and act like he used to around men: calm, cool, collected, _fine,_ like normal mortal people always were. He strained trying to remember, but he would, eventually, it would all come flooding back to him: the memories, the sensations, all of it, and he wouldn't make that big of a fool of himself.

Maybe he would get his _own_ kiss someday, instead of just laying on his back in bed and dreaming about it. What would he taste like? Would he match the sage, cigarette, bread, and leather smell that filled his house up till it was lapping through the cracks in the walls? Or would he be entirely different? Gerard wouldn't know for a while, so he had plenty of time to think.

Tomorrow, everything would be fine, and he would turn his stalking, brooding, monstrous brain into a patient, caring, human heart, devoid of any and all animalistic instinct and desire. He would keep his pretty little mouth shut and everything would be fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	7. vii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you all are enjoying your christmas / yule / early kwanzaa !!! i hope you have a lovely and bright time. if you don't celebrate any of those, happy vamp day.
> 
> thankyou all so so much for all your kind words, thankyou to my twitter mutuals once again for raving about my fics with me, i appreciate it very very much. it keeps me going. :D
> 
> anywayz, here's your chapter!! i hope it's a good highlight if you're like me and holidays just aren't for you. escape into this world for a little bit and be at ease.
> 
> follow me!!! >~<  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

All three of them were at the table again, and Ray hadn't even looked to see if his crystal glasses had been washed. He sat there next to Mikey and didn't feel the need to peel his eyes off of him. The sink was full of dishes but nobody had tended to them. For one, Gerard was too damn nervous, and both Ray and Mikey were too busy sharing a bed to remember that they'd both lived together in the house for five years, and therefore had cleaning responsibilities, so no one had gotten anything done in a couple days.

Gerard felt at ease with this, however. It was so much more peaceful to just forget about the drone of routine and constant consistency. Knowing that completion would arrive eventually was the breath of fresh air that he needed after all this time in stuffy rooms. He knew that Mikey wasn't too keen on changing the way things had been, but he could see the wedge being loosened from the heavy door in his mind as he sat, giggling, next to Ray. It was a rare sight for Mikey to be so chipper in the past five years, but that night in the rain flipped a switch inside of him, and Gerard smiled to himself. The entire house had lifted into the sky above the clouds so that everyone inside could see the airiness of the clarity. 

"Are we gonna go, or are you two gonna eat each other?" Gerard interrupted, bouncing his leg impatiently.

Mikey broke a kiss and sighed. He lingered an inch away from Ray's face, ducking his head down slightly so that Ray would kiss his forehead. He did. "Gee, we _just_ woke up, let me at least finish my coffee."

The moon was high in the sky and all the stars were bright like the holes poked in cardboard to let a child breathe in their imaginary spaceship dreams in the middle of the living room. It was 1:00am already.

"Yeah- _you_ just woke up, I've been up since eight." Gerard huffed and leaned back in his chair, crossing his legs.

"Hey man, relax. He's still awake, okay, he's a night owl-" Mikey got cut off by another peck from Ray.

"Yeah, he might be, but who the fuck shows up at someone's house at one in the fucking morning?"

Neither of them answered him, too preoccupied with each other.

Gerard moved to stand up, pushing the chair out with the back of his leg and flattening his palms on the table. "I'm just gonna go alone. I'm not listening to you two."

That was enough to get them both to stand up with him, hurrying to their coats, even though it was supposed to be getting warmer by now, it wasn't, it was only getting colder, and stumbling in the empty space to find shoes. Gerard just stood in place by the door, trying to figure out what lie to tell to make it seem like he was just a passerby. They'd gotten lost on the roads, they were estranged travelers, their car had broken down, _something,_ Gerard would figure it out.

"What are you gonna tell him?" Ray joined Gerard at his side, putting one of his hands on the doorknob and holding Mikey's behind his back.

"Fuck if I know." Gerard stepped back to allow Ray to open the door, and they both bolted out ahead of him.

He _was_ happy for them, damn it, he was just unsure of how long it was going to take to get used to it and unwind the tight coil of jealousy in his stomach. Maybe this outing would help.

"You'll figure it out, just make it up on the spot, you're good at that." Mikey called out from the porch, taking a second to stand on the steps he'd sat on with Ray the night before.

Gerard pressed his lips together and shut the door behind him. He _was_ good at it, and he would figure it out.

And then they were walking. Gerard's heart quickened with every step and the absence of something that'd be a little more comforting than _'we were just passing through town and we don't know where the fuck we are, is it warm in there?'_ would have to do. He hoped to God that the guy had enough kindness in his heart to invite them in for coffee.

The mile felt longer than it usually did. Gerard picked up his pace, trying his best to stay within the stamped path in the sweet grass while he moved along to his pulse. But it would be fine, everything would be fine. If the butterflies in his stomach were actually wasps, he'd know, and he'd turn around before he even got to the front door. But this was right. This was fine. At least he wasn't gonna be totally alone.

He could see him in his mind and smell his fireplace again. His long, wavy, black hair, the dull, dark ink under his skin, and his long, wide fingers, all of him, it only made Gerard want to run faster. 

The little cottage was the first one on the block. There were countless empty lots of barren soil and weeds for half a mile preceding, speckled with broken booze bottles and cigarette butts from the college kids who brought their parents' painkillers to frat parties. Gerard was sure that this guy hated that, he doubted he enjoyed staying up until 8:00am when everyone passed out in the morning sun. There just weren't any empty houses on Roth, so it's not like these kids had any choice between having safe, normal parties inside, where they're less likely to come face to face with a triplet of vampires stalking the guy who had just given everyone a joint to pass around at 5:00am, and blasting music into the wilderness and dancing on the grass, sticking their bare feet and thin shoes with glass, needles, and burrs. Neither of those options sounded even remotely fun to Gerard, but he did miss out on his last half of art school because he was turned into a goddamn vampire, so maybe it was worth the hangover and the tetanus boosters, he'd never know.

His house's white siding looked especially bright tonight under the moon and the stars, and its black, seed-littered shingled roof absorbed every lumen of the light. The windows were glowing orange and warm again, and a pale plume of smoke rose from the chimney on the left side of the house. Gerard took a deep breath in, inhaling the smoke like it was a premium cigarette. Blessed be the burn, he thought, waiting for the inevitable pungent pain in his chest to alight with how strong the gas was. It heated him over a lightning-lit blaze.

Gerard itched all over. If simply putting his hand on the doorknob to his garden door was overwhelming as is, and if sitting in the room with him was as tedious as it was, he was starting to grow increasingly nervous about shaking his hand and seeing him face to face. 

_We're just lost…_ he repeated, trying to comfort himself over the blaring thoughts in his head, needing one last reassuring word to allow him to commence forward. He prayed someone would take his cue.

"Gerard, you're walking past it." Ray sighed. He and Mikey were stopped at the driveway in front of the house, holding hands still for a split second before dropping them to their respective sides.

Gerard didn't say anything, he just jumped in his place and pivoted on his back foot, which was the one he'd narrowly escaped with last week, so he cringed at the tender bruise that hadn't even begun to fade yet. He joined Mikey and Ray at the foot of the pull-in.

"You do the honors." Mikey held his hand out, palm up, ushering Gerard ahead of them to the front door of the house.

Gerard's eyes were watering from the cold, the smoke, and the nerves under his skin, but this was what he wanted, this was the inevitable path, the gates through which he had to squeeze, and the course he was to follow, so there was no use in upholding hesitation. He numbly carried himself on for two steps before he gave up. "I can't do this. Can you guys come with me?" He turned back to face them when he was halfway up the driveway.

Mikey didn't even have to consider it, but he rolled his eyes anyway. He silently pulled Ray behind him and followed close.

Gerard's chest heaved as his knuckles were inches from the wooden door, and his hands shook, but he tucked one of them under his arm inside his jacket, trying to upkeep his image of some kind of lost night-owl. He swallowed the lump in his throat, bit down on his tongue with his back teeth, and knocked.

It was dead quiet inside. Then, he could hear him rustling around. He could hear his voice call _'coming!'_ over the fullness of the room and his light, airy footsteps coming ever closer. Gerard shut his eyes as tight as he could for just a second, and when he opened them, he had to scream at himself inside his head to just _shut the fuck up_ so that he could believe, for once, that things would be fine. That's what he told himself yesterday, right?

The door swung open and Gerard was smacked over the head with the smell of him again. Jesus Christ, he smelled like heaven, and just one breath of it was enough to soothe him. He hummed, just behind his teeth. And then, there he was.

"Hey, you guys okay?" His voice was like almonds, crisp and low, but smooth in the back of his throat. He was gentle like silk, coating like milk, and hard like candy that would only get lodged in your teeth.

Gerard was sure that he could write a ballad worth all of the Earth's time till he's taken down and staked through the heart about how lovely his voice sounded and it still wouldn't be enough. It still wouldn't encapsulate how soothing he was, how quickly he took his thoughts away, took his nerves down to the soil, and spoiled his very bones in luxury. No amount of literature in all the universe's languages would ever match how he felt. He was fucking _beautiful,_ even more up close than he'd ever be from afar, and Gerard took all of him in at once. His hair was shiny again, unwashed, like a crow, and his nose had a little bump in it. His tattoos were velvety under his skin, and there was a relatively new, pretty good sized scorpion drawn on the side of his neck, under his ear. He swallowed again, trying not to look too taken aback. His eyes were bright hazel, lighter than Gerard remembered them being, like a mixture of sea green and chestnut brown with a slight glint to them. His body was- oh my God- his body, Gerard thought, trying to discreetly hide how many times he was scanning him up and down within the second.

Gerard stuttered, trying to remember his lines. "Uh, yeah- yeah we're um… we were just passing through, we got lost, I don't know, I don't know where we are-"

"Okay, okay, it's alright, it's cold as balls out there, lucky shit that it isn't snowing, come inside, where it's warm." He stepped back, still holding the door open, and the piercings in his face caught the light. He had silver metal in his nose, his eyebrow, and his lip, and Gerard felt intoxicated.

He almost wanted to run away, to decline the offer, to hide, but Mikey and Ray were close to him and had already crossed over the threshold of the door. He took one last breath of fresh air before joining them in the swelteringly hot living room. He almost preferred the cold to the tachycardia. 

"So," the man started, already waltzing to the other side of the room and picking a leaf off of the basil plant he'd presumably been pruning in the kitchen before they had arrived, and took a bite out of it. "What brings you guys all the way out here this time of night?"

Gerard was busy taking in every inch of the place and trying to make it less obvious than it was that he was just staring at the guy's ass through his jeans as he stood at the counter. He barely heard the question he'd asked.

"Gerard's bad with directions." Mikey piped up, already making himself comfortable on the rug in front of the fireplace.

He didn't have to ask which one was Gerard, because he sniffled his nose, breaking his focus, and peered over at Mikey.

"That is _not_ what happened." He found comfort in the distraction. "You were the one who insisted we _walk."_

"You guys _walked?"_ The man let a stream of water collected in his palm run down his fingers into the plant.

"Again, not my idea." Gerard crossed his arms over his chest, pressing in as hard as he could so he could assure his racing heart that it had already crossed the finish line long ago, and so it didn't have to sprint like it was being chased inside his chest cavity anymore..

"You must be Gerard." He stood over him, directly in front of where he was sitting on the floor next to Mikey, and Gerard felt so small, even though he knew he was taller than him. He looked down at Gerard and smirked at him, subtly eyeing him as he sat cross-legged on the rug. "And you," _pointing at Ray,_ "I've seen you at the liquor store on Beverly like three times."

Ray nodded. "I'm Ray, this is Mikey, and that's his brother, Gerard, right. I do go there a lot."

His eyes lit up and the corner of his mouth crooked up slightly. "Mikey- like from the Godfather?" 

Mikey's eyelids relaxed to half-mast. "Yes," He sighed. "Like from the Godfather."

The second the man's eyes were off him, Gerard's went wide. He just stared at his own feet, watching the guy's legs move as he shifted his weight out of the corner of his vision.

He was just as short as Gerard remembered him being, his jeans were rolled at the ankles over his black socks. His legs were sturdy, thick thighs just barely concealed under the slightly baggy denim. Gerard was practically begging inside his mind that he'd sit down on that damned armchair again and swing one of them over the side.

"Cool, cool, my name's Frank."

_Frank._

Fuck, Gerard thought.

If anything in the world was cotton candy and leather, it was his name. Gerard felt like smoke, like a filter rolled between thin paper pages of The Bible. As far as he was concerned, the house was burning down and it smelled like baking bread. He could sit in it and watch the flames dance like the ceiling was a movie screen, holding him close and feeling the texture of his skin on his own, cinema ever closing in until they became actors in the film that neither of them would live to see the end of. Maybe Gerard liked it that way. Maybe getting the closure that he needed: that immortality was more than just eternal life- would be enough to kickstart the motor inside of him to finally live like he was meant to. To live like time really wasn't going to end, what's the use in tediously treading over cracks in the cement? What was within those cracks? What did they lead to? Did they lead to some sort of Paradise, where every soul inside of it was identical to this boy and his black hair? Frank's name was going to stay with him the entire time, regardless of whether or not his body did.

He crouched down to meet everyone at eye level, still positioned directly in front of Gerard, and stuck his hand out. Gerard had to yank his eyes up so that he wouldn't be staring between the legs of someone he was shaking the hand of. Gerard met his skin and he felt like he was on fire in the same good way, like each lick of heat flooded his eyes to make him look like the most inviting space that Creation had ever conceived. It was a dream like state, one that Gerard hadn't felt in way too long. It was the kind of mushy-gushy intimidation that you get around a crush that's just programmed into your brain, something wonderful and dreadful all at once. Oh, how long he could fucking chase it, bounding through the garden like a spring fawn and laughing at how he always hit the ground a step behind the other boy, watching and copying his every move so that he could live in his world. Gerard wanted to see what his world was like, mostly so that he could nosily sneak himself in and become it. Mostly so that he could steal it right away without him ever noticing a thing. Oh, how so very smitten.

His skin was soft, and his hand was strong, firm in its grip. He looked at Gerard, smirked again, and he felt increasingly at ease, like he'd known him his whole life. He didn't know what he was thinking earlier with his nausea because instinct settled in like a reflex just how he'd expected. He wanted so badly to just spring up onto his heels, grab his shirt by the collar, and kiss him. Gerard still wondered, in the back of his mind, what he'd taste like, how much hotter he would be compared to the last feed he'd had, and how he was gonna handle holding off of him for the next five and a half months. He was so _warm_ that, Gerard wasn't gonna lie, he was tempted for half a second. A miserable night this will be, time to celebrate.

He- or _Frank-_ kept his hand intertwined with Gerard's for a couple seconds longer than what Gerard felt was necessary, he was knee deep in the eye contact and his mouth was open slightly, but he shut it tight right after he noticed it so that he wouldn't see the spasms in the muscles of the roof of his mouth as he struggled to keep his teeth inside the tissue. It was when he let out a long sigh that Gerard could tell that he'd been drinking. So, already, after being here for less than five minutes, he'd already concluded that Frank was the type of guy to eat the leaves off of his herb plants and get flirty when he's tipsy. Good to know, he thought. He didn't hold the others' hands in the way that was even remotely close to the same way he'd shaken Gerard's, but he tried to ignore that even though it stuck into him like a needle.

"I noticed you have a lot of wards up, have people been jinxing you?" Mikey jutted in rather loudly and turned to look around the room with the classic, curious light in his eyes.

Gerard furrowed his brows at the question, squeezing his hands in his lap, trying to imitate the touch. He couldn't match it.

"I think that might just be the case, I have a lot of friends from a lot of places, so, who knows? But they don't seem to be working that well." Frank let his knees hit the wooden floor, and he sat directly across from Gerard while he spoke eccentrically with his hands. "I've had priests come through here three times, which is supposed to be my lucky number, good comes in threes, but God's mojo isn't cutting it. How do you know about this stuff? How can you tell?"

"We're uh-" Ray blinked and sat on his hands. "We're Catholic."

Gerard hummed a bit in the back of his throat, clenching his eyes shut at how bad they all were at lying. _'He's protecting himself against us, we look so dumb right now.'_ He was trying to shut himself in his little dream world, where no one else was there but him and Frank, and it was noiseless. Too bad Ray had broken the sound barrier to the sonic realm he was just getting to know with whatever that was.

Frank cocked his head to the side. "Oh really? I should be safe around you guys, then." He laughed and Gerard had to keep a moan in his stomach.

He couldn't wait to get out of here. The other two kept up a conversation of small talk, slipping lies in to and fro to keep their asses out of the flame, and Gerard was impressed, but he was pushing all his power into locking himself away again. There's no way that, if he was the only one leading this charade, he'd be able to keep it up for this long. He would have folded a long time ago if he hadn't brought everyone with him.

But, whatever, right? It seemed like Frank was just getting comfortable with them around, sometime after one in the morning, gathered around his fireplace like children on Christmas morning. It sure felt like Christmas, and Frank was the best present he'd ever gotten. This was _not_ how he expected this to go at all, he expected that he'd run away and apologize and have to stop somewhere along the side of the road, burn himself under the shop lights on the way to the back, and lock himself in the bathroom with the lights off, hell, he almost did, but it was going well enough that Gerard only wished for this with half of his immortal soul. It would only make it worse if he left now, anyway.

Finally, he could tune out the talking and relax inside his mind. The world he'd shut himself in was amazingly empty, like a void, but fancier. It was entirely composed of white light and there was a fountain pouring blood into a basin in the very center that Gerard would dip his fingers in every now and then. He waited for Frank to appear, patiently content with the blood collecting in the wrinkles of his skin and under his nails, and eventually, he showed up. Neither of them spoke. They just stared blankly at each other, far enough away in the endless expanse so that they couldn't see the other's pupils dilating and bouncing off the ground.

Frank was ethereal here. Gerard could taste his salt and iron in the blood he was sucking off his finger, and it was enough to keep him sane. He was wearing the exact outfit he was in now, standing stiffly off in the distance. Maybe he was a mirage…

"So, Gerard." 

His dream was broken off by Frank scooting a little closer to him. He blinked and met his eyes for what was probably the fiftieth time tonight.

"You guys have a place to stay, right? I can give you directions, unless Mikey's right about you butchering them."

He threw his brother a squinting glance. "He's _wrong_." Gerard sighed. "That'd be fine. We actually, uh, we live over on Carter, last house four blocks from the liquor store on Bev-"

"Dude, that's only a mile away, I could walk you all there if that makes it easier." Frank's lit up eyes started to move to face the front door.

Before Gerard could interject and apologize for clogging up his late night with excuses so that the boy didn't have to go to such trouble, Ray was already standing up and saying _that would be great,_ so he squeezed his thumbs in his fists again. Let people be nice… 

He watched him glide around the room, securing everything but the fire in the stove like an anxious little mouse, nose twitching and all. He walked with a slight hunch, holding his shoulders out in front of him like a sheet of paper crumpled into a ball.

The bitter flavor of the air outside the house was therapeutic. It gave Gerard something to think about other than the burning in his cheeks, and it sure as hell gave him an excuse for the splotchy scarlet stains under his skin. Frank walked slowly with his hands in his pockets, conversing with Ray and Mikey like lifelong family friends, and Gerard walked half a pace faster than everyone else with his head down, except for the occasional glance up at Frank and the scorpion on his neck. 

"Would you be down to get drinks with us sometime?" Ray had caught hold of Mikey's thumb in his hand and walked at the exact same meter as him, swinging their hands back and forth in time.

"I'd fucking love that."

Gerard didn't pay much attention. He thought he'd be totally overwhelmed and awkward and lost in him, but he wasn't. It wasn't that- no- it was a feeling of being completely sure that you belonged, but not quite knowing what to say for fear of plucking out too much of the suture holding everything in. Gerard was confident that Frank wouldn't mind spending time with him, in fact, he just said that he'd love to, but he, like most people, was hesitant to join the talking because he didn't want to hand too much of himself off. There was a happy medium here, and Gerard was gonna spend the next few months trying to find it.

Frank's hand brushed against his, he didn't think much of it other than that it was warm and he was getting cold. Frank muttered "Oh, sorry" and kept going with his conversation, musing on, something related to Rickets by Deftones, and Ray looked _very_ interested in buying a new record at the dim little shop down the road. Gerard whispered "It's okay" and it was. The corner of his mouth turned up a little because he was finally going to give himself the time to figure this out. No more desperation, no more animalistic hunger, this satisfied him, for now at least.

They all rounded the bend where the outcropping of the forest curved back into the dense brush and wilderness and Gerard almost felt piteous letting go of the company, even though he'd barely spoken. The street was empty and dead silent, near-burned-out lamps flickering just subtly enough. Ray stepped into the empty road and stuck his arms out, holding Mikey's hand and smiling. Gerard could feel their joy. It was two a.m. and he stood on Frank's right side.

"So, uh," Frank talked in a soft voice, trying not to disturb what was unfolding on his other side. He was walking a lot stiffer than he was when he was talking with Mikey and Ray, so the initiation of small talk signaled that he didn't actually have anything to say, but he felt like he should, so he'd make it up on the spot. _"Couples,_ am I right?" He pointed at them.

Gerard cleared his throat. Frank was practically leaning on him as they passed by a conveniently placed street sign that narrowed the path. "They've only been doing that for a day and I'm already sick of them." He jeered, trying to resolve the space between them by holding his breath until he went away. When he finally did, he released it.

"Oxytocin turns you into a whore." Frank said, stuffing his hands in his pockets again. "Your brain can't tell the first two months of a fling from hard drugs, get past that-" _sliding his hand out in front of him, palm down, in a line,_ "-and that's your reality."

"Tell me about it." Gerard chuckled a little, wondering how long it would take before his own brain gets its shit figured out. He wondered why Frank would tell him this, why he would just interject with that in the pitch black night and the freezing wind, why he would jump so keenly into friendly banter; it almost made him double-take. Whatever the cause was, it was nice to laugh at him for a reason that wasn't sinister and deadly. 

It was silent again as they reached the last block before Carter, and Gerard felt like he was already hooked on him. Like any new friend, he couldn't tear himself away. He searched frantically for something to say to fill the void. "Those records you were talking about sounded nice."

One of Frank's eyes hit a flickering street lamp and sparkled. "Yeah, they fucking formed me. Give them a listen sometime."

It wasn't working. The pauses in between were getting longer and Gerard just left it at that. Twenty-five going on immortal and he still can't carry on a simple social life.

"You know what, I have a turn-table, you all could come over one of these nights, I'll get some wine and we can smoke, that'd be fun, right?"

Gerard raised his eyebrows. "Yeah, it would."

Ray and Mikey were already sitting on the porch when Gerard and Frank caught up to them.

"How about Saturday night? Eight?" Frank proposed, stopping in the yard and turning towards him.

"We can do that."

"To new friends." Frank stuck his hand out to Gerard and he shook it.

"Cheers."

When he turned around and vanished beyond the hedge, Gerard felt colder than he thought he did all night. The wind stung his eyes and he shook all over, missing the empty space already. Maybe this would be okay. Maybe he would be okay. As he walked silently down the hallway to his room, he suddenly didn't know what or when his next meal would be. He almost didn't want to hurt him now, and if he did the inevitable and turned him, he wasn't sure if he wanted to include him in the misery that he had been subjected to all this time. But he wasn't in the mood to think about that. 

He had a new friend who was absolutely gorgeous and had invited everyone to his house to drink and smoke while listening to his favorite music. He'd known him for, at most, an hour, and it was already going better than most of his relationships with people he'd known since he was seven. It almost felt too soon, too courageous, and too strenuous, but- what the hell- maybe people were just nice. Maybe this was just how normal people operated. Their clocks are different, they perceive time in a wildly contrasting way, so maybe mortals can't live without a schedule. They don't have the time to waste away waiting for the right time because it counts down, tick, tock, tick, tock, every second closer and closer to the plain, straight, black-out end. Mortals have things to do, places to be, people to love, people to fuck, and a deadline to meet, so maybe this was true. Maybe Gerard just had to test the waters and trust a little. Hell, what meaning does the word _forever_ have without a little risk? There had to be more out there than just this little house on the edge of town, there had to be more people in the world than his brother and his brother's boyfriend, who was Gerard's only friend that he realized he barely knew. He couldn't live like this forever, it was time to make a change, and if that change was finally letting someone in, well, he was going to take it slowly, obviously, but most of all, he was gonna try. It wasn't like he was the only one putting in the effort, either.

What was better was that no one said a word about Frank to Gerard once they all entered the house, it seemed like this little bridge of accepting him into their lives was the next stage of clearing the fog before the oasis. If seeing him more meant proving to the others that he was not in fact completely off his head, he was going to take this best case scenario without hesitation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	8. viii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy new year!!! i hope this year is better in several ways, im rooting for you guys.
> 
> i have been persistently ill the past few days, so writing has been difficult, but thankfully i have some content stored up since i got ahead while i was ill. forward thinking. always gets me places.
> 
> here's the new years present you've all been waiting for!!!
> 
> follow me!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes

Gerard sat across from Mikey at the table after Ray had already gone to bed, promising to give them their space. Mikey sat stiffly with his legs facing the hallway, turning every now and then to peer down the narrow corridor and check if he'd leaned around the corner to ask him to come to bed with him.

The single candle in the center of the table was the only thing keeping the room lit, casting eerie shadows on their faces against their identical sharpened features. The flame danced and flickered about with their heavy breaths and contorted their shapes with each movement. This was just another one of those long nights where the brothers sat and talked, or at least tried to, empty in their chairs while the moon crawled back and forth over the horizon with their eyelids. The room was cool and it was raining again, wind still cycling throughout the space that still lingered from the once open front door. No wonder it was so cold out earlier, yet another storm had rolled in to douse whatever fire they had drummed up to keep them sane. But oh well, Mikey loved the rain, anyway.

Gerard studied every millimeter of the skin on his fingers, every wrinkle and hair and crease and pore looked like new. Even with the unfamiliar sensations it was the same routine: he opened a box of cards and shook them onto the table before dealing them out. Neither of them picked any up so Gerard cleared his throat.

"Look, I know you're still upset about that-"

Mikey took his glasses off and rubbed his face. "That was five years ago, okay? I don't know how many times we have to talk about it before we let ourselves get past it, but, oddly enough, there are several reasons why I'm upset right now."

"It's just- we haven't worked things out in nearly three weeks, like ignoring it is gonna let the festering wound close up on its own." Gerard tried to wedge his way into Mikey's world so he could at least figure out why he was all of a sudden shutting him out again.

 _"Oh,_ so now you're the expert of conflict management?" Mikey straightened in his seat and set one of his hands on the table in front of him. "Gee, we have actual infinite time to deal with that, and I don't know when the concept of immortality is gonna hit you, but we're dealing with your little heart jumping up and down in the pen right now: a mortal issue. Once it dies out- _then-"_

Gerard started to say something but he was stopped by Mikey's finger pointing in the air.

"We have forever to beat the grief out of each other, but you don't even care enough to talk about how you've got a crush on a feed, do you?"

"Of course I care, Mikey, what?" He twitched his eyes at him. "It's just- _fuck-_ there's so much right now, it's too goddamn much- I just want to know how you're doing."

"I'm _fine."_ Mikey said blankly, almost gritting his teeth. "What the hell are we gonna eat now?"

"I… I don't know." Gerard would have come up with a lie to get the blame taken off of him and to get Mikey to feel better and relax about the whole situation. If he just promised him that he would feed on him and bring his blood back in time for dinner, maybe he'd let off the gas, but he just couldn't bring anything up to the surface. Maybe he could just say he bit Frank but bring some random's fluid so that he could claim innocence and everyone could applaud him in his strength of abstinence. It felt like he was collapsing.

Mikey didn't say anything for a bit. He didn't snap at him or lick the knife that he was going to stab him with so that the last thing he would ever taste was sweet revenge and independence. Instead he just sat there, still glancing back at the thin, wooden floorboards over Gerard's shoulder. 

Gerard broke the curse. "I just want to know…" He trailed off, trying to tiptoe towards the words that would keep this as clean as possible. "I just-"

"Spit it out already, man." Mikey let his glasses fall from his hand as he moved to put them down and they clacked against the wood.

He pounded his fist on the table a single time before he spoke. "How come _you_ get to fall in love, but _I_ can't?" Instead of spitting the words out like he'd asked, he threw them at him, hissing and choking at the spasm in the back of his throat that moved like a wave to the roof of his mouth. He swallowed his teeth and waited for an answer that didn't look like it would come with good flavor.

Mikey didn't give him anything to taste. He just breathed heavily through his nose and Gerard could see his knuckles turning white. He peeked up, with his head tilted back and to the side, over Gerard's shoulder again. His eyes had a fleck of glitter in them but he didn't acknowledge this.

"You can sleep with Ray after a day and a half but I can't be around Frank after two weeks?" Gerard felt a tug in the bottom of his throat like the stone lodged there was turning over in its grave under a patch of tissue.

"What's the problem now?" Ray put his hands on the back of Gerard's chair and the tips of his sturdy fingers dug into his shoulders on either side.

"You and Mikey can have the whole world but I don't even get to live in it."

Ray furrowed his brow and moved to sit in his usual chair next to Mikey, but Gerard stopped him.

"I just have this stupid little crush on Frank and you guys are acting like I killed your cat." He spoke through the back of his head, shooting gamma rays through his ear to keep from facing the one who his brother loved more. "How do you two think I'm supposed to live like this while you can't go fifty seconds without swapping spit? I keep saying it, but I deserve love and I'm gonna get it _just_ as much as you."

"He's not saying that you _don't,_ He's saying that you need to be careful-" Ray got cut off.

"You think I'm not trying?" He growled, digging his nails into the surface that was keeping him grounded. "You think I'm just letting the wind guide my sails wheresoever it desires to meet at the end? You think this is my first rodeo on this goddamn bull? I've been human before, so has Ray, so you'd think that, out of anybody on this Earth who is _trying_ and gets it, it'd be me."

The room was heavy, like each droplet of rain outside was another ton placed on the scale preceding its imminent destruction. And Gerard wanted it to be that way. He wanted the whole world to come crashing down so that everyone could see how close his own was to the same demise, how tired he was of the same null and empty six months ever repeating, and how sick the void made him. Finally, after all these years of bottling everything up inside of him, the fizz was bubbling up and into the divots in the cap, building the pressure until the glass just fucking exploded into a trillion tiny pieces like powdered sugar.

"You _both_ know how I feel about him, you _both_ choose to ass your way in like you have any right. Mikey, I know you're still holding on to the way things were when you were seventeen before you turned me, but we're obviously not stupid kids anymore. Ray, I've lived up the hall from you for five years, seen you nearly every waking moment of every single day, and I don't even fucking know you. All I know is that you like to drink and kiss my brother. What the hell happened?" Gerard was sure he could talk for hours and never be able to clear up everything that was covering his eyes, nor would he ever be able to stop. He had been watching every item float over his sleepless body in his dreams for years as the routine moved drearily on and they all metastasized ever closer to his spinal cord so that each lash to the nerve fibers would paralyze him deeper and deeper until all he could do with himself was blink and seize with pain that his extremities were too numb to feel. This unleash was nothing compared to the stiffness.

No one answered. No one knew what the hell had happened, other than the obsessive, rotten, evil desires of killing and sucking and draining had reduced them all down to these desperate bodies with no recollection of the past and the joys that came with the ticking of the clock. Sure, they all reminisced on the cheapness of childhood and all the things they'd done to make it as cheery as time would allow it, but none of them truly recalled the bliss and how far they had drifted apart from it and each other.

"I'm done with all of this. I'm done with both of you tonight. Mikey took everything from me and now he won't even address how badly I want it all back. Neither of you have the guts to admit that I deserve a piece of the Heaven pie you made in _our_ kitchen that you never baked with the intention to share. I'm going to get closer to Frank whether you like it or not, and if you want a piece of _my_ pie, you better try your goddamn best to guess at the recipe. If you want to eat in five months, find your own fucking boy." Gerard stood up in a rush and didn't look at either of them. He slammed his door behind him and pulled the chair from his desk under the knob. 

Gerard wanted to sleep so badly, to just put it all behind him, hell, his chest was sore from all the clawing of the dogs inside of him as they were released out into the room, but it was just barely after two and nothing good would come out of sleeping in the middle of the night. Instead, he laid out on his back in bed, breathing through his nose so that he could calm the feral energy behind his lungs: all the purebreds that had matured into wolves after all this time howled with grief and bit with heavy jaws at his pale, iron-bathed organs. He knew that soon Mikey or Ray or both of them would come rebounding and hoping to hear the other end of the pole, so he savored the last few precious minutes alone.

What _did_ go wrong? What had actually happened to make things so different, so awful, so tense? There must have been a point where they stopped trusting each other and that little piece sent the puzzle falling to the floor and bursting into flames. It's like an unraveled scarf, really, and no amount of stitching could ever recover its charm, so it had to be cut from the cloth and knit all over again. But there had to be another way, right? Gerard was wholly sure that he wasn't going anywhere and leaving his brother, who doesn't feed, in some random house outside town without him, but he couldn't go on like this: pretending that there was any way to fix it. No matter how many times Mikey tried to make amends with him, they'd get on the staircase and climb their way up to the landing to rest and then fall down the stairs to paint themselves in bruises that they'd soon forget about. It's like running a marathon as fast as you can, just to realize it goes in a loop and you could have just stayed right where you were at the starting line and gotten the same result as anyone else. Ray was a contestant that was just in front of Gerard as he sprinted that he just couldn't catch up to, but ran in his draft and hid behind him to protect his skin in his shadow. He knew that he didn't like being as distant as he was, as someone who doesn't like to share every mountain and valley of every planet in his brain, he could tell that he wanted to be as much a part of his life as Mikey was, but something was holding him back and he couldn't tell what it was or how to break it down.

Gerard just wanted the Mikey who would come into his room unannounced and make him pick him up back. He wanted the Mikey who rubbed his face in his hair every chance he could get back. He wanted the brother that he'd always had back, but ever since he turned him, he slowly faded away until he was nothing but a puddle on the floor and a blurry smudge on the photo paper. _Still,_ after everything that had ensued, he couldn't help but yearn for the way things were and he hated himself for it. He hated himself for constantly letting himself fall back into every old pile of leaves that would only swallow him because he missed the shelter that it gave him.

The same little rapping on his door sounded from the other side of it and Gerard almost felt at home again.

"Gee?" Mikey's voice was small like it always used to be and that was exactly what he was intending.

He didn't reply back, still trying to keep the canines inside of him fed and happy so that they'd get more comfortable with staying outside until further notice. Gerard was torn between telling him off so that he could be alone with his training shock collar and bounding across the floor in a singular step to rip the door from its hinges and swallow himself in a hug.

"I wanna talk to you. Don't make me get the screwdriver."

Gerard wished now that he hadn't gotten bored one night when he was sixteen and taught Mikey how to get into any room no matter how many locks and braces were on the door. His methods of barricading himself in places where he could be in solitude were futile so he pulled himself out of bed and made his way to stand at the door. The second he moved the chair out from its spot, Mikey pushed the door open and bent at the back so he could bury his face in Gerard's chest and wrap his arms around him as tight as he could.

"I'm sorry." Mikey sighed. "I just- I thought about it… you know, what you said three weeks ago and earlier… you're right, okay? I'm an ass for not telling you that sooner. I thought that, if I acted like it didn't matter, then it wouldn't. It's just that I still don't know what to do about- all this."

"Well… yeah, I mean- how the hell do you deal with ruining someone's life? I may hate you for it but that doesn't mean I don't love you… you know that, right?" Gerard pulled back so he could look at Mikey's face.

"I know." Mikey wouldn't look him in the eye.

It was impossible for Gerard to be mad at him. He hated him with every definition of the word and resented what he'd made of him, but one look at his soft, youthful face was enough to make Gerard melt and revert right back to the way he talked to him when they were little. He wished it wasn't that way. He wished that he could have a conversation that didn't make him repress all his anger to make room for how much he loved him so that they could actually get somewhere, but everything in Gerard's life came and went in cycles and this was just the last curve in the road before he passed the red sign for the billionth time in a row.

"I don't expect a whole one-eighty here, doy, but all I need is for you and Ray to just live and let live. If you can fall in love, then so can I. I'm not all up in _your_ love life."

"Oh, yes, you are." Mikey nuzzled back into the crook of his shoulder and Gerard shifted his chin in its spot in Mikey's hair. "I know you were the first person Ray told."

Gerard smiled for half a second. "Okay, sure, maybe that, but I'm talking about flaring my nostrils every time you get hearts in your eyes and sticking that same nose up when you go on your fiftieth date of the hour."

"Pshh, fine. I just-"

"-Don't feel comfortable with Frank?" Gerard paused for a moment, rolling over each word with his tongue to taste how sweet they were to say. "You seemed plenty comfortable when you did all the talking earlier."

Mikey twitched like he was going to ask him how he knew what he was going to say, but at this point, he wasn't surprised anymore.

"I know that you want to protect me and I want to protect you, I know that you're trying to help, but you have to let me be my own person. You have to realize that the definition of never dying implies that risk and fantasy won't dig you into a rut, and I don't want to live forever knowing that I could have taken that jump while it was still alive, but I can't because he'll be long dead by then." Gerard spoke smoothly. 

"I just don't want to lose you." Mikey sniffled but he didn't cry, it was more like a desperate plea for a tighter hold on his brother so he could feel closer to him. 

"You _won't._ Mikey, I promise you, you won't. I'm gonna be fine, he's gonna be fine, _you're_ gonna be fine, alright? I know better than to just throw myself into a pit by my belt, if something's wrong, I'll leave it all behind and we'll figure it out. But until then, you have to understand that I can do it by myself."

Mikey hesitated, breathing heavy and feeling comforted. His back was starting to ache from his posture and so he squirmed a little. 

"Stand up straight and tell me that you'll try, Mikey."

He nodded and rested his chin on Gerard's shoulder, smelling his hair. 

"I want it all back as much as you do, but I don't know how to do it if you don't let me. We've kept things the same for so long that I don't remember the way they used to be. How can you miss something you don't remember?"

"You go back to the people who do." Mikey reached up and cupped the side of Gerard's face with his hand. "I do. I remember it all."

He looked at Mikey and didn't speak.

"All I need is for you to trust me, Gerard. I just want to _be_ someone to you. So, can you try for me too? Can we try together?"

After a beat, he gulped. "Yeah."

-

"Tonight is Friday, the seventeenth of April, just after sunset at 9:47pm, here's your coffee, Gee." Mikey strolled across the floor, mug in hand, and set it down in front of Gerard. 

He hummed at him and let the perfume rise into his face, rubbing the darkness around his eyes with the backs of his fingers.

"So, listening to music, drinking, and smoking at his house? Did he invite everyone or just you?" Ray rubbed Mikey's shoulder with a heavy, warm hand.

Ray had come around far before Gerard forced Mikey to, maybe he'd finally met someone who would be better at poker than Gerard and Mikey were so that he could have some slight resemblance to competition when it was too early to sleep and too populated to walk outside. Maybe he could finally get a breath of fresh air in terms of sets of eyes. Really, he was just anxious for Sunday's coming, Ray didn't especially feel that he fit in at the weekly gatherings: everyone was sophisticated, glamorous, and knew everyone else. Of course, Ray knew himself pretty well- he knew that he deserved as much as anyone to surround himself with vampires- but no one approached him and no one felt the need to introduce him to the customs and traditions that went on in that basement cave. He didn't really know why he kept going, he would think maybe one night they'd notice him and understand his loneliness, but each time, it was exactly the same. The door would open and Gerard would bolt out in front of him, pulling Mikey by the hand, and disappear around the corner, leaving Ray to his own devices. This time, he was being directed to a new person in a straight line and had lost all of his prior hesitation. It was more of a welcoming spell than one of nervous caging.

"Well, he said 'you all,' so my guess is as good as yours." Gerard took a big mouthful of coffee.

Ray took a deep breath while he followed Mikey around the room with his eyes, watching him prepare whatever waking routine he decided was going to work this time.

"Are you still going over there tonight to see him in the meantime?" Mikey filled his own mug with coffee and stood at the counter with it hugged close to his chest to warm up his tired bones.

Gerard nodded. "Yeah, I don't really have anything else to do."

Mikey and Ray looked at each other for a second and Gerard rolled his eyes.

"And- _yes,_ you guys can come."

This time, they would sit in the forest and hope that he left his curtains open, maybe they would talk things out, maybe they would stay quiet, and this time- _this time-_ they would think about the times when the adrenaline was still fresh and it filled all three of them with a sense of belonging. Nowadays, their world was growing smaller by the second and not a single blade of grass felt like it was real and theirs. 

And- well- Gerard missed Frank already: the smell of him, the texture of his skin, the mocha-smoothness of his voice, the greasy, waterwick shine of his hair… How quickly he took to them, how sweet he was, how he smiled at everything… He was somehow better than Gerard could have imagined and ten times as charming.

They carried on whatever small talk they could muster with a couple rounds of cards to finish coffee over, dealing decks of silence to make the time weigh a little heavier on the clock. Nothing ever made the wait any easier for him, he always felt like bouncing his leg was the only thing keeping him together before he broke into a dead sprint for the last quarter mile stint so that the others could pretend to know where he'd gone by the scent of his tracks. Gerard knew that this anxiety would only grow stronger until he could get his hands on him, so he spent a moment or two locked within himself and watching how the trees bent at the roots to make room for him.

They set off once again. The air outside wasn't any more inviting, and none of them felt any more welcome even though they were cloaked in the only thing that ever accepted them: darkness, mystique, calamity, and other things not worth digging nails through. The wind cursed at them through the whistling of the trees, beckoning them with voices as small as leaves but as evil as spades to see if they truly meant each step forward. 

Gerard squeezed his thumbs in his fists that he shook at the sky as the atmosphere clouded over any chance of spring warmth, hoping that this would be the last of winter's wrath. The road was lonely and desolate like it always was at night, staying devoted to the paved side was a chore when every ounce of you pleaded to jump into the woods, screaming all the way there in desperate calls that echo back into ringing ears. His feet felt like they were too light to support his weight but he trudged on, keeping them neatly within the packed grass path that weaved through the trees. He listened to the faint pat-pat of Mikey and Ray's shoes on the ground behind him, walking just a few paces ahead of them and facing the wind.

"Okay." Gerard heaved.

Mikey had already made himself a bed in the weeds, he sat cross-legged there and leaned his head against Ray's shoulder, watching the smoke rise from the chimney like it always did.

 _"Okay…"_ Gerard whispered to himself as he sat down next to Mikey in the pressed grass. 

The house was tired and dark, the only thing lighting up the space was Frank, sitting at the TV with his legs hugged to his chest. Gerard was infatuated with him again. 

They sat there for a while before any of them felt the need to bring anything up. It was so peaceful and the rustling of the trees above them almost sounded like a lullaby. It was still cold, so they huddled closer together.

"So," Ray broke the silence. "He's your weakness, huh?"

"My Achilles' heel." Gerard let his eyes fall all over him, staring as deeply as he could at every twist and turn.

Gerard scraped the side of one of his fangs with his thumbnail, pretending to file it down with whatever collagen was left, imagining what it would feel like to bite him, despite the fact that he had already sworn to himself that he was off the plan to feed off of him. He was conflicted again, torn at the very seams that held him above reality instead of the void cast endlessly beneath the fabric. Like cracks in cement, weeds pushed their bitter tendrils through and tickled at his ankles as he walked by, snagging his tender skin with chiggers that would bite and infect. Gerard just wanted to feel real, to feel like something in his cyclical quest was worth something, but it just felt like he was going nowhere. Of course, three weeks out of six months doesn't really leave much room for the interpretation of progress, and he had already met him face-to-face, but, usually, he would be feeling some sort of thrill by now. He'd be feeling the grip of someone's hands in his hair before he'd even reached their corner, begging to pull him closer so that he could entangle himself in them before he plotted out exactly which skin cell to tear apart first, but now, with Frank, he felt nothing but comfort. It was like watching the movie that you've always loved since you were a kid, predictable, safe. It was unnerving, he wasn't gonna lie, unfamiliar sensations tend to raise hair, but, at the same time, it was the bonfire to his shivering hands. 

"What do we do now, Gee?" Mikey asked, taking Gerard's hand with his own.

He didn't take his eyes off of the window, but he inhaled sharply. "I say we try to think back to the last time we felt like we knew each other; the last time we felt like family. If it's too far back to remember, then we start there and build it from the ground up." Gerard tried to think of when that could've been.

"New Year's, twenty-fifteen." Mikey jutted out. "That was the last day that I felt like your brother."

"You turned me a week later." Gerard shut his eyes to scan to the back of his brain and remembered it so vividly.

"Midnight on the seventh of January." Mikey gulped to swallow the acid in the back of his throat as his stomach ached with shame. His fangs had been retracted for so long he wasn't sure if they even moved anymore. "How do we fix it?"

"I don't know."

Ray rubbed Mikey's temple as he spoke, feeling the energy pulsing off of him through his fingertips. He could tell that he was desperate to make things right, to finally go back to the bounty of love that he'd left behind. Meanwhile, Ray couldn't even remember the last time he felt like someone's- or _someone-_ for the life of him. He'd been a vampire for as long as his brain would let him believe, whether that be a week or seven centuries, he'd never be able to tell. But maybe it was there. Maybe he really knew, he just needed to sit down and do some digging. It's not like he knew anyone who knew him when he was human anymore who would be able to stand next to him and retell the story, he'd let his fangs drop one time in front of his family and no one ever looked back to see if he'd made it onto the other side of the chasm, they just ran, scattering in all directions except for towards him. Maybe he would have preferred that, even if they ended up staking him and getting it over with. Maybe he would be happier now, but he'd gotten too far and too close to the Way brothers to ever consider that option anymore. His only option was to collect the bricks he'd been trying to make with individual grains of sand and start stacking them up to see what he could fashion.

"Is it even worth it?" Mikey asked.

"Of course it is." Gerard squeezed his hand tighter. "We've got too much time on our hands for anything to be worth nothing."

"But how do we gauge that? How do we know what the point of anything is when we have no compass to lead by?" Mikey turned and looked at Gerard.

"We don't." He met his eyes. "It's a gut feeling. I just know."

"I trust you, right?"

"I know you're trying to."

Ray watched as Frank's face slowly became more disturbed, fear rushing to his extremities with the color from his face. He furrowed his brow as he saw him pick up a dagger from the table and stand up. In one quick motion, he grabbed the rosary from its hook and wrapped it around his wrist, big eyes darting around the room. "Guys," Ray caught their attention.

They both looked up at once and saw that his Bible was on the floor again, and the TV screen had frozen on a scene of red light, filling the room with crimson. Gerard blew a tiny bit of air from his nose.

Mikey started to move to stand. "Should we le-"

"Sh." Gerard held his finger in the air. "It's okay."

Frank flipped his hair out of his face and bent down to pick up the book that he held to his chest. A flimsy believer, Gerard thought, one to discredit the power of God, all while clinging so tightly to it like contradiction will earn you anything in the eyes of someone- or something- that ultimately doesn't care, if He's even real at all, which everyone doubted, especially after everything they'd been through. If God was real, he wouldn't have let them suffer like this, and if He was real, he would be protecting Frank from them like he thought, but He wasn't. There was truly nothing to hide from, the three were just sitting there and talking, but with as much sheer terror in his eyes, the danger was as pungent as a sulfur spring. There's no one there to save you… Gerard relished in the sense of power that gave him. Sure, he wasn't going to do anything with that, but he liked feeling like he had some sort of role in the way nature overturned his losses. 

They waited until the TV resumed and he sat back down in his chair, relaxed, before they spoke again.

"That's always fun to watch." Gerard cackled.

"So, it's okay?" Mikey seemed a little hesitant. He slid his hand into Ray's and he held it with both of them.

"Yeah, it's fine." Gerard brushed a lock of hair out of Mikey's face. "Sorry for scaring you."

"You didn't." He let the tension out of his muscles. "I'm trying."

"And that's enough. That's all I need you to do."

"Where do we, uh- where do we start?" Mikey tripped over his words as Ray kissed the side of his head.

"Well, what do you miss the most?"

It took Mikey a second to think of one single thing. The long talks in the backyard on summer nights, the walks to school side-by-side, the food fights, the digging, taking the dog on adventures with them, or the pale, bare wood of a tree with its bark stripped off that they would lean against because it was smooth and just hug each other. They fixed their lives with that tree: it was where they cried and told each other they were sorry, where they talked about what they'd do if Mikey ever bit anyone, and where they had forged the only promise they'd ever made to each other: never bite family, and most importantly, never bite _me,_ Gerard said. And they'd shaken on it, pinky promised on it, done everything they possibly could that would seal the deal that was still broken a week later. It was a New Year's resolution, a pledge that would always be carved into the tree with the words: _'Never bite G.'_

"I miss _you."_ Mikey settled. "I miss everything." He looked away from Gerard and back at Frank through the window. "I miss when being with you used to mean something."

"Me too." He paused. "What do you want it to mean now?"

Mikey swallowed. "I want to trust you. I want to believe that every little second will be okay because that's what you always told me. I want to feel like I can always come to you."

"Then we'll start there." Gerard followed Frank through the room and around the corner where he vanished into the hallway. The house went totally dark and the last of the smoke choked out of the chimney like coughs from a smoker's throat. The forest felt frigid and empty now, and Gerard was becoming increasingly aware of how alone and vulnerable they were. "I promise I'll try if you do." He stood up with the rest and stuck his pinky out to Mikey.

"So do I." Mikey didn't take his finger, he just hugged him as tight as he could and tried his best to hide his shaking limbs.

"I've got you, Mikey. Nothing in this world will ever hurt you. I will protect you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	9. ix

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome back! it feels like it's been forever since i posted last (even tho it has only been a week, what) so i am very excited to give you guys this chapter. 
> 
> i hope you all are enjoying the new year despite its craziness already. i hope you all are well. <3
> 
> off with the rambling [i'm also becoming more active on tumblr- see below]
> 
> follow me !!!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

The living room was bright and none of the candles had been lit yet. Gerard moved quickly with shaking, freshly woken muscles, pouring himself a mug of coffee and drinking it black as it scalded the back of his throat and his tongue. His head was spinning and his eyes stung with spots that the light had bored into them to get closer to the action of his pulse, but inside his mind, he was tranquil, determined, and singular. Gerard was motivated to move towards one thing: being in Frank's presence again. Saturday couldn't have come any slower, but now that it was finally here, Gerard rushed to bask in it as quickly as he could.

"Mikey, here's yours, take this one to Ray." Gerard held two mugs in trembling hands.

"Jesus, man." Mikey muttered under his breath.

They sat down at the table half in their chairs and half angled to face the door while Gerard paced.

"Dude, are you  _ that  _ nervous? I promise he won't bite you." Ray jeered and winced at the exceptional bitterness of his plain, nearly boiling coffee. He had his arm loosely hooked around Mikey's neck.

"I'm worried  _ I'll  _ bite him." 

For some reason, Gerard thought that the coffee would slow him down and give him some sort of peace within the heat, but it was actually doing the opposite and getting him even more worked up. Giving his mouth something to do besides worry, worry, worry was kind of working, but he had no idea how he was gonna function once he was done with it. It hurt his stomach and made his teeth chatter with how many of his nerves were on fire, but he held onto hope that the bottom of the mug would hold the key to a vial of sedative.

"Hey, if it makes you feel any better, you'll be drinking, so it won't be long before you're too tipsy to care." Ray was right. 

Gerard hummed into another sip and rested his hand on Mikey's shoulder.

"We'll all be there, anyway." Mikey slid his fingertip between two of Gerard's knuckles to try and comfort him, and it worked.

"I've also never smoked a joint before." Gerard suddenly felt like he didn't know what to do with himself. He wasn't sure why that was so embarrassing.

"You haven't? I mean, you smoke cigarettes sometimes, how much different could it be?"

"That's what I'm not sure about…" Gerard trailed off as he finished his coffee, throwing his head back to catch the very last drop. "Have any of you had one?"

It was silent for a minute or so while they thought about it, and then Mikey piped up.

"I have, under the bleachers at a random high school I didn't go to at four in the morning with Cath and Luke when we were juniors-"

"Hold on... " Gerard cocked his head to the side.  _ "That's  _ why you never told me how that sleepover went."

"Yeah," Mikey cringed. "It must have been shitty weed because I didn't feel anything, but they  _ said  _ they spent a hundred bucks on a single joint, so, who knows?"

"Hm." Gerard pursed his lips for a second before he wandered around the room for his shoes.

"And I doubt he's gonna force you to do it if you don't want to." Ray followed suit and routinely brushed his hair out of his face so that he could see. It was starting to get annoying.

"Yeah, I know." Gerard sounded insecure, wringing his hands out while he tied the laces so that they would, for the love of all things, stop shaking.

"Oh, Gee, you know there's nothing wrong with that, right? We're grown ass men, we're not gonna make fun of you." Ray reassured him.

He nodded and stood up. "I know, I know, I'm just… I'm nervous."

"Hey, you'll be fine. If you need air just ask for it." Ray patted him on the shoulder. "You alright?"

"Yeah." He looked down at himself. "Do I look okay?"

"Of course you do." Ray led Gerard in front of him with a heavy hand on the nape of his neck and held Mikey's hand behind him with the other one as they walked out the door.

Gerard shoved that interaction out of his mind while he noticed that the evening air was finally warm after all that time, a refreshing breath to breathe. Each step felt like it took an eternity to complete, he counted them in groups of tens so that he could keep his mind occupied on something other than this dawning feeling that he wasn't going to be enough for him. He knew that he was, what a stupid thing to think, he was the damn most seductive thing on the planet, that's for sure, so he had a grip on any and everything that he could ever want to hold in his hands, but tonight, the glamor took more energy than it usually did. Something about Frank made him weak and want to growl. All he could think about before was to be close to him, to feel his skin against his own, to sink his teeth into it: that same soft, supple flesh, but when it came to someone as hypnotic and acidic as him, he wanted to take it as slow as possible to absorb as much of him as he could so that he could watch it seep into his cells. One-by-one, shutting him down three nanometers at a time. Frank was like a story: if you look away at the wrong time, you miss it all. If Gerard was a story, he'd be illegible.

Right now, on the treacherous mile, Gerard felt like a stain. His stomach refused to settle and his muscles forbade release so that he was unable to douse the flames, and all his efforts did was smudge the ink even deeper into the fibers of the page. As long as it kept his vitals in check, he'd be fine with painting the whole thing black. The verdigris that held the hole in his heart together was leaching into his bloodstream and poisoning him with each ventricle contraction, but he didn't seem to care. It made him feel alive in a cocktail swirling with contradictions dyed blood red; equal parts of distilled spirits spiked with nervous adrenaline, terrified serotonin, and electric dopamine. Whatever keeps your eyes above the salt on the rim will fulfill your every wish. 

They passed by a rosemary bush that had started to flower and Gerard plucked a piece of stem off of it, crushing the leaves between his fingers and rubbing the oil on his neck. He wished he could do this more often, he loved the smell of it. Maybe it would keep him sane, maybe it would help this make more sense, maybe it would protect him, whatever, at least it was another constant to focus on before they rounded the street corner and walked through the dead, yellow grass of another vacant lot. Gerard couldn't count the number of broken glass shards. He watched his shoes in the dark with wide eyes that were surprisingly more relaxed than not in the evening moonlight. He tried to block out the sound of Mikey and Ray's carrying on behind him for the last few hundred feet, dearly wanting to explain the longing in his chest and how badly he missed it. 

Finally, the stretch of pavement leading up to Frank's front door was nauseatingly steep tonight, but the cement was soft in the warmth so it gave his ankles a break.

"After you." Ray was still holding Mikey's hand.

"God, take me." Gerard reached the porch and squeezed his thumb in his fist before he knocked on the door.

He waited for the hyper little rhythm of his socks on the wooden floor as he approached the entryway, and when they came, there was a shrill of recant in the back of Gerard's throat. He moved to turn around but Mikey stopped him by holding onto his shoulders, planting him firmly on the ground.

Gerard could feel the heat coming off of the house, warm orange light seeping from every crack and gap it could find with its luminous tendrils. It was finally a tolerable temperature outside so it wasn't as desperately inviting as it would have been a week beforehand, but listening to the whirr of the fan motor in the back of his wood stove could thaw out even the coldest of hearts.

Frank opened the door and immediately smiled at them. He smelled like basil and sage, his face was softer in the spring air, and his hands looked like they had finally gotten the blood flow and pigment back into them after such a long frost. His hair was washed, wavy, and frizzy, falling into his face in neat locks that he ran his hand through to push up and back. Gerard took him in.

"I'm so glad you all could make it, I have so many records to play, oh my God, you would not  _ believe  _ last night…" He trailed off as he danced through the living room, obviously signalling for them all to come in, but no one tried to follow him around.

Mikey planted himself on the carpet, instinctually in front of the fireplace that housed a weak fire, where Ray sat next to him, toying with the hair that stuck out of his beanie. This left Gerard standing awkwardly by the door with his hands stuffed in his pockets. The lights were slightly too bright and he squinted to adjust to them, blinking repeatedly so he could look like hay fever was just swinging on too fast of a pitch for him to catch.

"Make yourselves comfortable." Frank set an intricately engraved wood box on the coffee table and knelt down in front of it on the floor between the armchair and the table, tapping the pads of his fingers on the lid. "How many of you are up for a joint?"

Mikey and Ray raised their hands and scooted closer to him as he opened the box to do whatever someone who routinely smokes weed needs to do, Gerard had no idea, but he felt left out watching Ray lean in over Frank's shoulder. He was almost about to say something when his thought process was interrupted.

"Where'd you go-" Frank snapped his fingers, trying to remember his name. Ray whispered it to him. "-Gerard, want to join us?"

He nodded. It can't be that bad, he thought, what the hell, it's not like cigarettes were any better. If he was going to spend the evening with his crush, he was going to spend every second as close to him as he could. He shrugged off his brain and stepped around the table to sit across from Frank.

He could see all of him here. He looked just as wonderful as he always did, but instead of a winter pillar of evergreen trees, he looked like a spring thicket, blossoming, blooming, fresh with energy. He guessed that mortal people looked more lively when it wasn't one in the morning.

"We'll do this later, I wanna put on some music and fucking  _ drink  _ first because I've had one hell of a two days, but I just wanted to make sure you all are on board. Sweet."

As soon as Gerard had sat down and gotten himself situated, Frank got up and stood at the counter, where he slid a bottle of red wine towards him, searching his drawers and cabinets for a corkscrew. Gerard knew he could just push his fangs down, stick one into the cork, and pull it out that way, but what house guest opens a new bottle of wine with their teeth? Frank eventually found one and when the familiar  _ pop  _ rang through the room, Mikey jumped like he always did. Gerard looked up at him and Ray and took a deep breath to make sure that they were both still there. They raised their eyebrows at him and turned to watch Frank arrange all the glasses in a nice row of four before he turned his record player on and let the vinyl that was already on the turntable play quietly over the speakers.

"Around the Fur by Deftones. Seriously, the best fucking album ever made." My Own Summer started and Gerard forgot about everything.

Before he knew it, he had half a glass of wine in his stomach and his shoulders were relaxed, he was sitting next to Frank with his arms resting on the coffee table, watching Ray and Mikey steal the conversation again. He was fine with that, really, he loved all the sounds and the flavors of being near him, gentle speaking on the rocks, and his blessed fucking beauty that kept Gerard from getting swirled up in the sensory overwhelm that was the living room in that moment.

The wine was incredible, he leaned his head all the way back to drink the last of his glass in one gulp, softly putting it back down on the table and pushing it towards the center as he let himself practically melt into it. He rested his head on his arms and let them stand over him, fingers limp and face smiling wide and blissfully.

"Gee, you've only had a glass, how are you drunk already?" Mikey mumbled in his ear as he rubbed his back.

"I'm not, I'm just happy." He straightened himself out and shut his eyes to feel the music coursing through his veins. It really couldn't be  _ that  _ good, though it was still pretty decent, but any experience that took his thoughts of loneliness and misery away was one worth diving into with every ounce he could possibly use.

Frank already had a joint between his lips and Gerard was awakened by the sound of him flicking the almost empty lighter ten times before it gave a flame. He watched him take a long, deep, heavy drag and hand it right to him. He had seriously been needing a smoke for _ days  _ now, so he gladly took it, not even worrying about the remnants of spit left on the paper. He breathed in, expecting some effect, but felt nothing. Maybe it took longer, he thought, blowing the smoke out of the corner of his mouth and watching it billow up to gather at the ceiling. 

"So," Frank spoke quietly for some reason and drank more of his wine. "What do you think?"

"It's nice." Gerard replied.

"Good." He tapped along to the beat with his fingers in his lap like he didn't expect Gerard to see, but he did, and he watched him for a while. 

He admired him as he took another long breath and blew the smoke out in front of him so that he could lean in and sit in it. He held it between his fingers and made Gerard take it from him, accepting another opportunity to touch him and connect one more invisible thread to his skin. He let his eyes shut as he inhaled, then opened them again to look at Mikey and shrug.

"I'm not feeling anything, are you guys?" He let out a long sigh and let the smoke rise.

Ray and Mikey shook their heads.

"Is this your first time?" Frank asked. "For some people it takes a while."

"Uh, yeah- I, uh… I haven't done this before- I- I mean, I smoke cigarettes but-" Gerard felt that same humiliation surfacing again, almost making him want to run for the door and hide.

"That's alright, man. Nothing bad. You two aren't feeling it yet?"

They both said no, but shrugged it off, hoping Frank would give them some sort of reassurance, but instead he just looked at them for a few seconds and seemed unsettled.

_ Vampires can't get high? Are you kidding me? Now he's onto us. _

Gerard realized he shouldn't have spoken up about his literal lack of metabolism, but what part of this made any sense at all? He could drink and get drunk, smoke cigarettes and get buzzed, but he couldn't smoke weed and get high, which was insanely confusing. Mikey and Ray hid glares under their relaxed, softened faces and Gerard only felt that realization intensify. It would have been nice to be briefed beforehand on what not to let slip, but how many times have they been around a human this intimately in the past five years where they could have this kind of knowledge? It wasn't like they were old enough to consider these things when Gerard got turned and they all started living together, anyway. Frank did seem unnerved by this information, maybe he got a tip from the church that it was something to look out for, but the more puffs he took off the joint, the less he seemed to care. He handed it to Gerard again and he pleaded with it to just make him feel a sliver of something so he could slow down the racing of his heart that was giving him away.

The roof of his mouth itched with the twitches in the muscles there, the points of his fangs were sticking into his gums as the tissue refused to contract to give them room. Gerard kept his lips sealed, locking his jaw in its place so that he wouldn't lose his wit.

"Here, if that isn't doing it for you, let me get you another glass." Frank stood up and refilled Gerard's wine, adding a splash more than what he had to begin with. He filled up his own and drank a large swig of it on his way back to the table.

He sat down a little closer to Gerard, almost touching his knee, and set the drink in front of him. He passed the joint to Mikey, who didn't look like he was getting any satisfaction from it, and took a sip of it, remembering what the calming sensation felt like. It was comforting, something to slow his mind down, something to keep his thoughts at bay.

"You don't have to keep smoking if it's not working, okay? We can just talk." Frank swallowed another mouthful.

Gerard nodded, not anticipating Frank curling his finger back and forth to get him to lean in closer to him. He was suddenly inches from his face and staring intently into his eyes and Gerard stopped breathing entirely.

"Open your eyes real big for me. I wanna see." He said, furrowing his brow in focus and opening his mouth slightly.

Gerard did just so, almost habitually as Frank eased slightly closer, investigating the state of his eyeballs for some reason.

"Your eyes are just barely pinkish." He said. "I bet it'll kick in soon, but I get it if you don't want to keep trying." He returned to his spot on the rug and fidgeted with the wooden box he kept all his supplies in, rearranging them for the fiftieth time.

Gerard cleared his throat and tried to find his scattered senses. He swore inside his mind and scarfed down more wine, but it wasn't cutting it enough.

"I'm gonna- uh, I'm gonna go to the bathroom real fast." He stood up and stuffed his hands in his pockets again.

"Down the hall, to the right." Frank angled his hand accordingly, jabbing it forward and then bending it back and to the right at the wrist to imitate the direction in case Gerard forgot which was which.

He remembered it from the last few times he was here anyway, Frank had a bad habit of leaving all his doors open, so it wasn't hard to find his way around, especially with the lights on, which makes everything significantly easier.

He shut the door behind him, locked it, and slapped both switches to turn the fan on. The humming hid him in its cloak. He sighed and leaned against the vanity, turned the water on, and splashed some into his face. He was ashamed to have to rub his eyes with freezing cold water to calm his body down from whatever the hell that was, breathless from how close he came to losing control. He looked stupid. He could have just completed that last stretch- those final inches- and kissed him so passionately, moving down his face until he moaned and stretched out his neck just enough for him to bite down and turn his lights out. He could have drained him dry and saved his blood in the pouches he always leaves in his pocket so that, when the sixth month comes, they wouldn't have to lift a finger, but he didn't. He didn't do anything. He just opened his eyes wide like he told him to and now he has to take care of the discomfort in his jeans like a fucking loser. He hated whatever this was: he hated being this needy, it sure as hell didn't do his back any good, but if all good things come in threes, he still had more doors to slump against.

There was no way he could deal with this now, not after what happened last time, not while everyone else was out on the other side of the door, patiently awaiting his return, but he was past the point of letting it be and going back out. So instead, he stood there, with the sink running water still, staring at his face in the mirror and trying to think of what to do. Gerard could still remember what Frank had sounded like before, his breathy voice and his heartbeat that he could actually hear now- that was  _ not  _ helping at all- how desperate it made him out to be. He could still remember how close to him that night made him feel, and how much destruction that caused. How much fear he struck into him, how narrowly he escaped, how he almost ruined things. He remembered how scared it made Mikey, and how he refused to leave his side when he got hurt, even though the little flesh wound wouldn't do any actual damage to him. The emotional toll almost made it so it wasn't worth it, but they'd all already come to an agreement that they were in too deep now to back out, and Gerard had invested too much time and energy into this feed to give up on it. That was part of life, he supposed, being fully aware of how things are tearing you apart, but being too close to the end goal to turn around and go all the way back. Oh well, he was already there, inches from him, drinking good wine while good music played in the background. 

He wished that he'd get up and ask him if he needed help, if he needed company, or  _ something  _ to make him feel less alone, but there was no sound except for the low volume guitar of whatever song on the album was playing now and the muffled chatter in the living room mixed with coughs and clearing throats. He was going to be here for a while.

Maybe if he just focused on staying present, maybe if he resisted the indulgence of sinking completely in, maybe if he just rationalized things, he'd be able to fix his problem. He wanted to abstain, to control himself like he did back there, but to no avail. He already had his hand down and before he could snap himself awake, his eyes rolled back into his head.

Gerard jerked them back to their original position and kept them open, staring with the same unwavering eyes at the washcloth hanging on the towel rack. If he was going to wreak havoc, he had to focus on something that wouldn't ruin absolutely everything. The pleasure flooded his psyche and filled him to the brim from the tips of his fingernails to his eyelashes, from the bottoms of his feet to the hair on the back of his neck, and all the way to the center of his spine. He watched as the little square of cloth swung gently on the rack, back and forth with his own rhythm. He sat on the floor against the bathtub and let his entire body relax into his hand, gently biting his tongue to stay quiet. Gerard focused all his energy on keeping his eyes open and watching the washcloth, making sure that was the only thing that moved in the entire house. With each stroke the high got stronger and he could feel intoxication coiling in his stomach, it was getting harder and harder to hold his eyes open and stay calm the closer he got to climax, but it came quicker than he thought. His eyes rolled back in his head again and he was greeted by the faceless white heat for ten seconds before his sight went black and dead. 

Gerard blinked and the washcloth was still swaying like it had been and everyone outside was still talking like they had been. He let his breath out and moaned into his sleeve. He stood up, buttoned his jeans, cleaned himself up, and waited for his strength to return with his sanity. He felt so damn dirty and he dreaded stepping out of the door. It had only been five minutes at most, which made Gerard feel lucky for finishing so damn quick, and it was unlikely that they'd suspect a thing since Frank was probably already too tipsy and high to care.

He splashed his face with more ice cold water and rubbed his eyes, looked at himself in the mirror, took a deep breath, and turned the doorknob.

-

The moon was high in the sky now. It was past midnight and they'd finished the bottle of wine. Well, Gerard finished the bottle of wine, drinking himself out of his head and leaning half asleep on Mikey's shoulder. He was snoring with his eyes open. Ray was deep in a discussion of space and his favorite planets with Frank while Mikey nursed Gerard's nausea with an ice cube folded inside a dish towel on the back of his neck.

"God, Gee, when did your tolerance get so weak?" Mikey whispered, intermittently squeezing Gerard's fingers and the pressure point on the inside of his wrist.

Gerard didn't answer. He didn't know where to start.

"We should probably get him home, Toro," Mikey turned to Ray and laid a hand on his thigh to catch his attention. 

"I'm not walking." Gerard mumbled, swallowing his acidic, grape flavored spit to keep from rustling his guts too much.

"Need me to drive you guys home?" Frank perked right up. It seemed like he'd had to drive while he was the opposite of sober enough times to sort himself out pretty quickly.

"Mhm…" Gerard held his hand stiffly over his eyes to shield them from the lights that had already been dimmed, but were still too bright for his upset stomach.

"Okay, can you stand, Gee?" Mikey shifted to hold him under one of his armpits and lifted him to his feet like he'd done it a million times, firmly holding his thumb just under the heel of Gerard's hand the entire time.

From there, he stumbled out to Frank's beat up black two door car that he leaned against while Mikey and Ray piled into the back together. He slowly let himself slide into the passenger seat next to Frank, who reached across him to buckle his seat belt. He was too nauseous to let his breath hitch.

The street lights were red-hot against the dirty windshield but Gerard blinked to recover his sight, watching the road creep slowly by with the gentle bending of the very tops of the trees. Frank's car smelled like cigarettes, weed, and so distinctly like him that it felt like a hug. The seats were soft cloth and warm and he drove the car slowly to keep him stable. No one was out on the roads anyway, especially not so far into the outskirts of town, so he could pretty much do anything without getting caught out there. The shadows of Frank's face were illuminated with dark, rusty orange and he looked like the best fever dream Gerard had ever seen. He had to fight with his stomach to keep from reaching up and over and touching him because he wasn't sure if he'd be able to let go.

The backs of his thighs were tight and stiff from the tension and they shook each time the car turned and his legs tilted with the sway. He was exhausted, but peaceful. Gerard was fine with surrendering totally to the darkness and the passing, flashing, flickering lights if it meant he could stay still with him forever. Frank looked over at Gerard, presumably checking on whether his speed was too much, and when he met his eyes, he only grew more sure. Gerard really liked him, jacking off in the bathroom aside. He begged his body to just be fine so that he could spend all the remaining minutes of eternity with him and feel this feeling, but it stayed collected over him like a cloud of fog and it didn't show signs of thinning. Frank took a hand off the wheel and squeezed Gerard's shoulder.

"Still doing alright?" He spoke softly, just over Ray and Mikey behind them.

Gerard groaned as Frank braked a little too abruptly.

"Sorry." Frank reached over, took his hand, and pressed his thumb  _ hard _ into the pressure point on his wrist that Mikey had been holding earlier. "It'll go away soon. You'll be okay, I promise."

He let a tiny whimper bellow in his throat at how good he was at taking his dizziness away, closed his eyes, and covered them with his other hand. 

The car came to a mild stop in front of the guys' little house and Frank didn't immediately let go of his hand. He waited until Gerard pulled away and opened the door so that he could shuffle to the porch steps.

"Thank you so much for tonight. It means a lot." Ray shook Frank's hand and kept his other one on Mikey.

Gerard already felt empty and cold. He hated goodbyes and if he had to be alone for another second, he would go insane. He barely remembered how he ended up inside the house by himself, but he fell into bed and let out the entire night in a single, long, groan. Mikey eased himself in and took his shoes off, replaced his jeans with sweatpants, and pulled the covers over his weak bones. The last thing he saw was Mikey setting a cup of water and a plastic bucket next to his bed before rubbing his face in his hair… and then the lights went out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	10. x

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hai again!!! i am still in shambles from frank's new ep, it's my new favorite of all the things he's done :D
> 
> school started back up again for me this week and it is going well so far. i hope you guys are having a stress-free week as well, and if not, let this be an escape for you. 
> 
> i've added content warnings in the notes section of the series cover and i recommend that you go read those so you can know what to expect (it's a bit late X_x i know but this series will be very long)
> 
> i love you all, thankyou for the support, we're almost at 700 views!! wowz!!
> 
> follow me!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

Gerard woke up at seven o'clock the next night. It was finally Sunday and he could go to the gathering again after missing it for so long. He sat up just enough to chug the entire cup of water that Mikey had set out for him last night before falling onto his back again.

He must not have been drunk at all yesterday, despite all the booze he drank, because he felt perfectly fine, but he took a deep breath and called for Mikey anyway.

He came rushing in and placed his hand on his forehead. "Feeling better?"

"Yeah. Just needed to sleep it off, I guess." Gerard sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed.

"See? He told you it'd be okay." Mikey handed him his jeans from the floor. "You were out for a  _ long  _ time. You were probably overwhelmed by the weed, I was kinda dizzy too last night, me and Ray were up till five playing cards."

"What day even  _ is  _ it?" He grumbled and rubbed his face, pulling his jeans on over his pale, tired legs. He sort of knew, but he liked it better when Mikey told him.

"It's seven on April 19, the sun just went down. Are you up for the meeting tonight? Me and Ray are gonna stay back here."

"You guys aren't gonna go?" Gerard wasn't really surprised, he knew that neither of them liked the meetings very much, but they went along to make him happy so he didn't really mind once he got there and distracted himself.

"You said it yourself, it's time for some change around here. You go, have your fun, and we'll be just fine. Ray will look after me… or whatever." Mikey tried not to roll his eyes, but he knew that Gerard always felt like he could let himself be alone when Mikey was being taken care of, and he wanted him to have some time to himself, especially after everything that's been going on in the whirlwind, so he gave him that little piece of confirmation.

"Okay…" He sighed, reaching up in the dark to pat the side of Mikey's face. "You're right. I will."

"It starts in an hour, at eight, so get ready and I'll make you coffee. Drink more water first, though." Mikey pulled a bottle of water out of literal nowhere and emptied it into the red plastic cup on Gerard's nightstand. "Glad you didn't need the bucket."

"So am I." Gerard picked up the cup and drank a few sips.

It was silent for a moment, then Mikey cleared his throat.

"Um- Ray and I are gonna go out, so… the pot will be brewing for you once you're up and you can go by yourself. Maybe try and catch a ride, all that walking isn't doing any of us any good." He stood up and stopped by the door. "Love you."

"Love you too."

His door shut and he sat listening to them talk as they prepared to leave. He still wasn't used to being anywhere without them- or without them at all- so the house felt empty. He heard them scuffling along the floor in their shoes and quickly hurried out to the foyer to hug Mikey as tightly as he could. 

"I'll miss you tonight too, Gee." He rubbed his face in his hair and he let go.

"Don't stay out too late."

"I won't, mom."

Ray rested his arm on Gerard's shoulder as he moved past him out the door and it shut behind him.

Gerard sighed again. It was rare that the house was this quiet, cold, and lonely. It was nothing like being home alone when he was a teenager, a time when he valued it the most. It was desolate and isolating and he didn't like it, but it gave him some freedom. He didn't have to worry about anyone's guilt or the ghosts that haunted them, he didn't have to worry about caring for everyone's possible need, he could just exist, but that didn't make it any easier to endure. It was a love-hate relationship and Gerard was both sides of the blade of being alone. 

When he was younger, being alone meant he could call boys, play his music as loud as he wanted, jack off in his bed where it was comfortable instead of in the locked bathroom, and let go of all the baggage that he felt he needed to carry for everyone else around him. It was suffocating being the only one who knew about his brother's secret hunger and having to be his sole protector above his own parents. He would never be able to retell how that made him feel and how it still affects him today. Gerard wasn't gonna lie to himself, he still had to breathe his way out of the starts of panic attacks each time Mikey left the house without him for fear that someone would take him, hurt him, kill him, who the fuck knows, and he'd be letting him down. Tonight was another one of those times. He calmed himself down with his hand on his stomach and repeated that he's with Ray and nothing bad would happen. It'd be okay. He watched them disappear around the corner and into the night.

The coffee maker beeped and he poured some into a black mug that he sat down at his usual spot at the table with. He wanted to run out the door and find Mikey so badly, but he knew he'd just tell him the same thing he just told himself: it'll be okay, and shrug him off again. He couldn't help it, he couldn't help but worry, but sprinting out the door on a leg that's just barely healed for the same regurgitated response really wouldn't help. So he sat stiffly in the hard chair with his black coffee and bounced his leg to let out the tension in his spinal cord.

_ Just an hour longer… Just wait an hour more…  _ He prayed with bastardly hope that the affirmations would work before the caffeine kicked in. 

Gerard reminisced on yesterday's life: a life that seemed like it was already long past. It felt like he was reincarnated and his roots had already grown away from the dried up soil to somewhere fertile to start anew. Frank really did look beautiful, with his dark hair, warm skin, and all the wonders of his voice, keeping Gerard locked in a royal trance. He wondered what he was up to today; maybe he worked a nine to five, maybe he surrounded himself with friends and kin through the weekend days, maybe he just stayed home alone missing him in the same way. Gerard didn't expect him to pine like he was, he was sure he wasn't anything to him yet besides an acquaintance, but there was something comfortingly human about wishing to occupy space. Mortals missed each other and Gerard wanted that feeling back. If nothing else, he hoped he at least thought about him once today. 

Eventually, Gerard decided he was done thinking about it. He got up and retrieved his phone from his pocket to try and call someone from the nest to see if they could pick him up, but instead of doing that, he just stared at his contact list. He couldn't bring himself to swallow his pride like that, so he resolved to chew on it like a dog bone and found the door in the dark. 

It was warm out again, the wind was mild, heavy, and fell short of biting his face to curl around his shoulders like a wool scarf. He could see the stars tonight but they seemed to sweat and smear with the humidity, dotting the orange and brown hazy sky like grains of wet sand. Maybe one day he'd count them and keep them all in his pocket so that he could put them on display. 

It was a bit longer of a walk from the house to the cave than to Frank's, so the alone time was very much appreciated. It wasn't a cure all, he still wished that he'd cross paths with his brother but he never did, the night just grew darker and darker. No one was out tonight; usually the occasional couple would be out walking their dogs or children would be playing in the distance, but it was dead silent and it spooked him a bit. He listened to his own breathing on top of the hum of the city and squinted at his shoes on the cement like they would give him company. It  _ was  _ nice to be alone but Gerard couldn't decide if he liked it or not. He hated being this indecisive, relying on everyone in the house to argue well enough to persuade him to choose a side, even though he was supposed to be the unofficial leader of the group and always have his shit together. This whole process of changing things made him dizzy because he really had no idea who he was outside of this life, outside of the death, gore, and despair that clogged his pores. He had no idea what he wanted in the future, or if he even wanted one at all, which was another hurdle, so how was he to know whether being alone right now would fix things? Gerard wondered if Frank had any insights, any answers, any shards of guidance to spare for him, and-  _ fuck-  _ he missed him.

Coming around the bend, he could finally hear voices, and it eased him slightly. At least thirty vampires were congregated outside the stairwell down to the basement, chatting about whatever vampires chat about on Sunday nights, and as Gerard weaved between them to the door, he was greeted by turning heads and nothing more and he felt entirely at home.

He dove down the steps and the red lights covered him, bumping past heavy set shoulders like he was barely legal and it was his first time in a nightclub.

"Gerard Way!" A familiar voice called out to him and grabbed him by the waist, pulling him deep into a crowd neatly arranged in a circle.

He smiled and raised his hand to wave.

"We haven't seen you in so long we thought you were staked." One joked, poking a finger at his chest to mimic the act. "So, we've heard noise that you've gotten quite intimate with a potential feed, am I correct?" A medium height, middle aged woman spoke to him in an accent that was far too flamboyant to be real, an exaggeration of the Victorian fantasy Gerard wished he had the guts to bury himself in.

"If we're putting it that way, yes, you are." Gerard rolled his eyes to focus on a point directly above him so that he could picture Frank in his mind.

"Well, aren't you going to catch us up? Where have you been?"

Gerard cleared his throat and straightened his posture. "I believe it's been a long time coming."

A couple cheers and applause erupted from the circle, slightly louder than the rest of the room, but it didn't rouse much. Gerard never considered himself 'well-known' around here, nor did he consider these people to be any more than time fillers, acquaintances, or even strangers for that matter, but he liked the friendliness in the way they always pried stories from him. 

"The first time I saw him, I was coming back from feeding on the last girl that you know, and I was instantly into him. He has long, dark hair that goes to here." Gerard pointed at the very bottom of his neck. "Hazel eyes, and the warmest skin you could ever imagine. He's the sweetest thing, about five-six, and- get this- he has four piercings and more tattoos than I can count." 

The girl who pulled him into the circle raised one of her eyebrows. "Where's he pierced? What's his neck like?" She stepped closer to him and Gerard got a closer look at her. He couldn't pick out why she looked so familiar. Maybe he'd seen her here before, or her voice was just common. He didn't think much of it, but he felt himself getting possessive again, wanting to growl at her to back off of the interrogation so he could keep Frank's image to himself.

"Ease off, Rue." Another woman's voice beckoned her a few steps to his side so that Gerard could breathe in the center of the circle.

It was when he looked at her from the space between that he connected the dots. "Ruth?"

"You rang?" She looked like she wanted to say more but she grabbed him by the waist again and led him out of the crowd that resumed their chatter like Gerard wasn't even there to begin with. They stopped in a narrow corridor untouched by light to the far left of the room that he hadn't noticed was there before.

Gerard just stared at her. "But you work under all those lights in the liquor st-"

"How do you think the sunscreen industry is still afloat in rural New Jersey, honey? I work the night shift for a reason." 

"When did you get turned? I could never tell."

"Oh, I've always been a vamp, Gerard. I was your pal Toro's confidant for a decade before you came along and we had a little something going for a month or so until he… well." She tossed her hand up in front of her like Gerard would understand what she meant.

He kind of did, but  _ what the hell?  _

"Listen," Ruth started. "For as long as I've been a part of your life, you'd think you'd know me a bit better than you do. And- before you get all clung and hung, I'm  _ definitely  _ not gonna steal your boy, I couldn't even go out with Ray for more than a month before he told me he was in love with your brother and I seem to be the magic reactant that turns everyone I love gay- hell- I just realized I'm a lesbian like… a year and a half ago, so…"

Gerard had to take a second to process all that. "Oh, nice- well, good for you, um…"

"All I'm saying is, I understand the pull you feel to that guy. It's a special kind of love, isn't it?" Ruth softened against the opposite wall of the hallway and put her hands in her back pockets.

"I guess so." Gerard cooled off and relaxed against his own wall.

"By the way, I'm sorry if I kinda put you on the spot out there. Your body language just stuck out in the way you talked about him."

Gerard twitched in his place. "It's nothing, I barely cut into the block. I guess it  _ is  _ an instinct."

"It is. But hey, us two, we gotta stick together, you know?"

He nodded, trying to conjure up something to say. He suddenly felt bad for assuming she'd want his portion of the platter and loosened his grip on his little picture of Frank that he was holding with white knuckles.

"So anyway, tell me more about him. I'll try and see what you're getting at."

Gerard tried to hide the glow in his face for fear it would light up the building and blind everyone. "I've met him twice now and both times he's made me absolutely crazy. He's like no one I've ever seen before and I've talked to guys my whole life. The first time I let myself into his house I tripped and slashed my leg open, and last night I had to get drunk so that I wouldn't lose my mind." Gerard felt his face get hot but he ignored it. The last thing he needed was to make sure everyone knew how heavy of a load he was carrying. "Everytime he touches me, it's like an electric shock. Any control that I've ever had just flies out the window."

"I know how that feels." Ruth looked like she was staring at her own little photograph inside her mind, distant eyes and slack jaw making her look at ease.

"Oh, do you?" He rolled his head toward her.

"Her name's Rosemary." Her face instantly lit up and she twitched in her place to keep from going totally limp to let her heart pilot. "Five-foot-two redhead,  _ covered  _ in freckles, she is the sweetest woman I've ever met and I've met a lot of women. She sews her own clothes, has a septum ring, takes care of birds that hit her windows, and her smile…" She drifted off and grinned to herself before it all drained out of her. "I bet you don't want to hear about girls, huh?"

"That's not true, Ruth." Gerard moved a little closer to her in reassurance. "Talk as long as you want, I asked you anyway."

Ruth took her hands out of her pockets and picked at her nails. She gnawed at the inside of her cheek to try and make herself present.

"You said it yourself, we need to stick together, remember? You don't want to hear about boys but you still listened."

She inhaled sharply through her nose and straightened her back. "I think she's the love of my life. I don't ever want to hurt her-  _ God-  _ I'll kill myself before I pluck a single hair from her body, but I'm  _ so  _ fucking hungry that I feel like I'm dying. I was supposed to feed off of her, but instead we've been dating for a year and… Gerard, I don't know what to do."

"Is that what this is all about?" He asked softly, noticing now how frail and thin she looked in her baggy clothes he figured that she wore to hide how starving she was, not wanting anyone to worry.

She nodded, hugging her arms to her chest. "I need help."

"Have you told anyone? When was the last time you saw Ray?"

"When you two came to the store… five days ago, but I haven't  _ talked  _ to him in at least two years. We broke it off when he told me about Mikey and we've only exchanged small talk ever since."

_ Damn, he's liked Mikey for that long… _

"We can help you, okay? I can take you home with me and get you something to eat. When was the last time you ate?"

"A year and half ago. I was supposed to bite Rosemary when I met her at a bar one night but I just couldn't do it. I went home with her and that was it for me. I had already been hungry for several months at that point, you know?" Ruth rubbed a sore spot in her ribs.

"Jesus Christ, Ruth. Stay here, I'll try and find someone who has something you can-"

"No," She cut him off by grabbing his wrist. "I'm fine. I- I can wait till the witching hour."

Gerard just looked at her with pursed lips. "No, you can't. I'm not letting you go hungry. You're already draining yourself away." He gently pulled her fingers off and set out into the crowd again.

He started thinking about how terrified he was of this fate, of falling completely into the pool with Frank and drowning in the deep end, taking him down with him. He was scared of losing himself inside of him, forgetting the desperation, the instinct, the craving, and leaving behind everything that keeps him alive until he'd rubbed all his skin away to infect the raw flesh underneath his sharpened face. Gerard knew that this was inevitably going to happen to him, especially given how much he missed Frank and his presence. He was being totally honest with himself, he hadn't thought about biting him in a while, he could only find desperation in touching him, in his body against his, in  _ love.  _ His stomach churned and he dreaded the path he was leading himself down. Ray and Mikey were right all along, and he had convinced them both that they weren't. He had manipulated his own brother to believe that he was tearing everything down and apart when he was only trying to protect him from certain doom.

"Does anyone have a blood pouch? I need it, something's wrong." He repeated it and no one gave him any more than a passing glare, ignoring how much faster the room was spinning.

It seemed like he must have been wandering for hours, dizzy, stiff, and nauseous like the room was a microscopic bacteria on the deck of a ship cascading through the swells. Walls caving in, people bumping into him, swearing, pushes away.

"She needs help." He kept muttering to himself, trying to find his footing and get someone to listen. No one ever did.

Gerard gave up and ran through the gaps in the crowds until he found Ruth standing weakly in the corner of the little hallway, right where he left her. She was leaning against the wall with all her weight and the circles around her eyes were dark purple-ish-gray. 

"Come with me." He tried to sling her arm around his shoulder so she could walk with him, but she wouldn't budge. He just picked her up bridal style and hoped that she would hold on to him. She did, clinging to his neck with all her strength. 

"I'm so glad you came." She said into the crook of his shoulder.

Gerard didn't say anything, he just tried to keep his cool till he got out to the fresh air again. He prayed that Mikey and Ray would be home soon so he could fall completely apart once Ruth was safe and taken care of.

_ "I'm sorry."  _ She mumbled, draping her arm over her eyes.

"Don't be." He whispered. "You're gonna be okay."

-

Gerard set her down and opened the front door, ushering her in. She sat down on an armchair and let out a long sigh.

"You've gotta be exhausted." He had already rounded the corner and started rummaging through Ray's liquor cabinet.

"That's an understatement." She paused. "She's so worried about me. I keep telling her I'm going to therapy every Sunday so that she doesn't know, I can't bear to tell her."

"I understand that." He settled on a couple pouches and found his way back to the living room. She was sitting directly underneath the chip in the wall.

Ruth lit up when she saw the deep crimson through the clear plastic. Every inch of her pulled to it, her fangs dropped instantly, but she waited patiently for Gerard to hand it to her. She looked like she wanted to say something, but she must have forgotten all about it as she pulled the cap off of the first pouch with her teeth.

The relief that flooded her face was worth a million words. Her eyes filled with tears and she blinked them away.

"Let me know if you need more, we have plenty." Gerard watched her for a few seconds, making sure that she was getting fed. He went back off to the kitchen and took a shot of the first flask he saw. 

"Gerard," Ruth called, wiping the blood from her lip and licking it off her finger. His head popped out from around the corner. "Thank you."

"It's nothing. You know you can always come here, right? Sure, you don't know me and Mikey as well as you know Ray but- hey, with as much history as you guys have, you may as well be family."

She opened the next pouch and sucked a long sip from it. Little by little, the color started to return as her dark veins began to fade under thickening skin. Gerard sat next to her and thought to himself.

He really was going to have to face this reality, whether or not he wanted to wasn't an option. No matter how monstrous he got, no matter how much he let the bloodlust get to him, no matter how far he deluded himself with hunting him down for survival, he was always going to have a human heart and it burned with every beat. He hated how much it ruined everything, making him pull like a bead on a string to Frank so that he convinced himself he was pathetic for even wanting connection at all. He wanted to shut himself in his room and barricade the door, cover his eyes and bind his hands so that he couldn't touch himself and see him there in front of him. He wanted Frank to be gone from him so he wouldn't end up this empty but he was fully aware that he was far past any point of retrieval. As far as he was concerned, he was exactly like Ruth and already fading just as fast as her.

"You're in the same pit as me, aren't you?" She swallowed another gulp of blood, eyes still closed as she monitored how it coated her throat.

He nodded and looked her in the eye. He saw the life in them. He saw how healed she was. He regretted ever stopping at Frank's house in the first place.

"There's still a chance for us." She drank more. "Whatever they say down at the nest about love is bullshit. If you've been around them for as long as I have, you know no one gives a single shit about how much you love someone. None of them have ever loved anyone in their lives, and they never will for as long as this place is standing and there's air to breathe. They  _ pretend  _ to like your stories but all they're really here for is to get horny over how you describe men and what they fucking taste like. No one cares enough to hear about girls and it sucks but no one cares about anyone but themselves. Old vampires are selfish as the Devil himself."

Gerard just listened to her talk, wondering why it took him so long to find her.

"You wanna know why Ray never likes going? It's because no one cares if you're lonely. No one cares if you need a friend. No one cares about anything. All they want to know is if you're willing to let them cut you open and take a drink in exchange for a blowjob. If you're starving, too damn bad, you shouldn't have let your humanity surface because you're  _ not  _ human, you never have been and you never will be. It doesn't matter if you were turned at Creation or fifteen minutes ago, if you show an ounce of mortality, you're just an infiltrator. I've been going every Sunday for a year, trying to get help and no one has ever listened to me. Why the hell do I even still try, you know?" Ruth tilted her head back to drink the rest of the blood from the pouch.

"I'm so sorry." Gerard talked gently, pitying her and studying her intently. It was finally making sense. As observant as Gerard thought he was, he clearly had only been dwelling on the surface of life where everyone else was too close to the bottom to hear his footsteps on the water that he hoped sounded like cries for help. He realized how long it had been since someone had listened to him as much as Ruth had, and he'd only really known her for less than an hour.

"It's fine, there's obviously nothing I can do. What I'm saying is, that's why you don't feel like you know yourself. That's why you can't wrap your head around falling in love, wanting to be intimate, close, fawning for that touch. Because human desire is… well- human. Everyone wants to be wanted. Everyone wants to be loved. But when you let yourself become obsessed with being a monster, that's all you're ever gonna believe you are, and it steals everything from you. Take it from someone who's been there."

"I trust that." He took the empty pouches from her and set them on the floor by his feet.

Ruth didn't say anything for a while. She took slow breaths and twirled a lock of her dark, auburn hair between two of her fingers. Gerard knew that she was right, but he was dumbfounded by how everyone around him felt no need to tell him these things. It'd been five years since he was turned and even though Mikey had his whole life's experience to confide in him, he kept all of it bottled up. He used to tell Gerard everything when they were kids, but he hadn't heard any of this before. Of course, it's different when you're doing it all alone with no help because you have no outside guidance or handbooks for  _ what to do if your little brother's a vampire,  _ so it wasn't like he could blame him for it, but being left in the dark doesn't leave a good taste in anyone's mouth.

"I'm sorry no one told you sooner." She said. "I know it's lonely, I know."

Gerard felt choked up. He had to stifle a whimper in his throat to keep from crying from how comforted he was by her. "Is there… is there any way I can still… "

"There always is. Love knows its way around. You know that, you're just unsure because no one's ever shown it to you. If I can give this girl every ounce of myself, you can trust that you have something to your soul that's not just madness."

"I like him. I like him so much. I can't stop thinking about him." Gerard swallowed his tears and looked at the image of him in his brain again. He looked so peaceful.

"You never will. These people stick to you forever, regardless of whether you make them or not. And, worst comes to worst, you can always turn them, it's easier than it looks."

He shook his head.

"And I know you don't want it to ever come to that. I can't imagine it either, but it's my last resort. If I'm gonna be with Rosemary forever, I need to be with her forever. It's unavoidable. That's part of life; mortal or immortal, it doesn't make any difference. You need to do things that make you look like the world's biggest contradiction because you just said you'd never hurt them because it stung you, but now you have to let it sting both of you for all of eternity because no one can fucking help being in love. It just can't be broken, no matter how hard you try. Even if it breaks you, you still feel that pull, that magnetization, and it's bound to happen. I really hope that, one day, I can promise you that it'll all be worth it. None of this makes any goddamn sense, Gerard."

"No, it doesn't." He stared at her hands and how strong they were, how much life they'd seen, how wise they made her look. Gerard admired her. He wondered how many victims they'd choked out and how much skin she'd had to scrub off to the get the blood out of the wrinkles.

"We have each other though, you know? We're just two gay sons of bitches who are never gonna die. How lucky is that?"

It was extremely lucky, but Gerard didn't consider this to be a four leaf clover of a night. He didn't consider himself very fortunate to have tangled himself in mortal business after he thought he'd had it all together for so long, but now that the knot was fraying he really couldn't tell his past from his future anymore. It all blurred together.

"You're still just a person, and so am I, even though you're more of one than I've ever been. People care, I promise they do. I mean, look at me. You care, and you care enough to make the right decision with the boy you've got. You know what to do."

"I can't-"

"Yes, you can. You have love inside of you-  _ so much-  _ I can see it. I know how much you feel for him, how much you  _ yearn  _ for him, how badly you want to wrap your hands so tightly around his waist and feel his pulse so that you can be reminded of what it was like to be human. I know, Gerard. Don't doubt it, it'll only dig you further away. I know this because I feel the same way. It's possible, you just have to show up and try." Ruth put one of her hands on his shoulders. "Promise me that you won't break yourself running away from this. It's okay."

He looked at her face now, at her soft face, and he saw that she meant every word of it. He just couldn't comprehend it. "I don't want to push him away."

"Then pull him in. You're not an animal, you're normal. It's okay." Something about the repeating of the last phrase made the whole room feel lighter. Maybe it  _ was  _ okay.

It was. Gerard knew that all along, but his overthinking, over-analyzing, overwhelmed mind was buried in the hypothetical that only drove him insane. 

"I should go." She moved to stand up.

"Wait-" Gerard stopped her but didn't move. "My brother should be home soon, Ray too, just stay for a few minutes more, I can call him."

"I don't think I can see him." She rose from her seat and faced the door.

"Why not? Did something happen?"

"No, but I can't explain it. It's nothing about Ray, I've actually been meaning to rekindle things with him for a while now but-"

"Is there something with Mikey and you?"

She didn't answer, but she really didn't have to.

"Wh-" Gerard got cut off by the door opening and Mikey coming face to face with her. He didn't say anything, but he looked at her for a while.

"Ruth?" Ray walked in and touched Mikey's back to pass him. "What are you doing here?"

"It's a long story." She tensed up and dragged her hands down her hips to wipe the sweat off of them. "I was just about to leave, I'll let you guys have your family time." Her entire demeanor changed until she was the same old Ruth from the liquor store on Beverly.

She stared at her feet as she slid past Mikey, who was still standing in the doorway.

"Ruth, wait!" Gerard chased her out the door and into the driveway. It shut behind him. "What's wrong?"

The night was quiet and thick. It must be about to rain.

"I can't tell you right now, I just need to go. Maybe I'll talk to you about it someday, but I just can't. I'll see you next week. It's okay, alright?" She turned away and rounded the corner. Then she was gone.

Gerard sulked back inside, stopping to pick the pouches up from the floor and tossing them in the trash. Mikey and Ray were in the middle of talking, but when he walked past them, he took Mikey's hand and led him to his room.

"Why was she acting like that around you?" He asked.

Mikey shrugged.

"Oh, don't act like you don't know. No one ever tells me anything-"

"Gee." He said his name rather sharply. "Don't start."

"But why? Did something happen? I thought we were done unpacking things."

"We are." Mikey pulled out of Gerard's grip and went back out to the kitchen to resume whatever it was they were talking about.

Gerard couldn't decide if he wanted to storm out and yell at him or lock his door and cry. He just stayed, paralyzed to the floor, listening to Mikey tell Ray that he loved him. Today just wasn't adding up and no amount of information was settling his stomach. He just wanted someone to be honest with him, to pay attention to him so he wasn't just sitting in the dark. He really thought that they were finally getting somewhere in terms of fixing things, but it turns out, they were much farther away from a resolution than he thought.

After a while, Mikey came back into his room and Gerard was still standing there, picking at the skin on his lips.

"I'm sorry, okay? I was just in the middle of something and we didn't expect you to be home."

"What the hell was that?" He asked, slowly, trying to keep whatever emotion he was feeling, he couldn't tell, inside of his body instead of snapping at him.

"I don't know, she and Ray used to date, maybe she's awkward around him. She kind of is when we see her at the store."

"She told me that things were fine between her and Ray, she just didn't want to see  _ you."  _ Gerard turned to Mikey and finally moved his creaking legs. "Why doesn't she want to see you?"

"How am I supposed to know? What did she tell you?"

"She wouldn't say anything, you saw her run out the door when you came home, that should be as great a judge as ever."

Mikey crossed his arms. "I'm not a mind reader." He let go of the defense when Gerard glared at him. "I'm sure everything's fine. The girl's tired, she works the night shift. Besides, she was probably off to work soon, anyway. I wouldn't worry about it too much."

"Of course  _ you  _ wouldn't…" Gerard whispered under his breath and Mikey didn't hear him.

"You should paint something, you haven't in a while."

Gerard shrugged, imitating the way Mikey had done it earlier.

He skipped out to the living room, silently, and Gerard caught Ray taking his hand as they left again. The front door shut  _ hard  _ this time, and it was cold just like it was when he woke up that evening. He wanted to run outside and hug him, make him tell him it was okay, and beg him to stay and rub his face in his hair while he held his hands. But he wasn't going to, he wasn't going to care, and no one was going to give him a passing thought. Gerard sat on his bed and lingered on the fact that no one was going to tell him anything anymore, so he just had to go with his gut. It took everything he had in him to stay grounded and not drift off into space like a ghost to go see if Frank was home. He didn't think he could walk another mile, anyway. He just hoped that Ruth was okay and that Mikey and Ray were having a good time without him. He just hoped that they'd be okay. He just hoped that it would be okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	11. xi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hai again!!! i have had a Very long week, hence the slow upload today (afternoon rather than first thing in the morning) but i finally finished all of my homework for the week so here i am with another vampire update!! 
> 
> i really skipped ahead this chapter because my vow to slow burn was becoming a little possessive so i got a prenup and pushed the timeline forward a little. hope it makes it a little easier to bear
> 
> anyway!! idek if yall read these notes but i like writing them so!! here we go
> 
> follow me if u feel liek it xx  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

It'd been nearly a month since he'd been around Frank and Gerard was growing restless. He had no idea when he'd ever get to be with him again, so he filled the time with sitting in the tamped down grass in the forest and staring at his closed curtains. He hadn't actually steadily  _ seen  _ him in a couple weeks, he must be either hiding something from the world or he'd finally gotten over leaving himself so vulnerable to the wilderness. Gerard had to expertly hide himself and go unexpectedly invisible a few times since there'd been four parties in a row in the empty lot next door to Frank's that kept distracting him from the nights he'd left the curtains open. Kids are loud and especially annoying when one is trying to lick his lips while the man he's watching twitches in his seat as he fights falling asleep. The urge to just run up his driveway and carry him off to bed, planting gentle kisses on his forehead as he curls around his waist so that he can't let go and has to resort to watching him sleep is a hard urge to swallow. 

Gerard hadn't talked to Mikey or Ray in a while. It wasn't unusual, it was normal to sometimes have spells like this where they just get bored of each other until something fun enough to speak about pops up, but that didn't make it any less miserable and lonely. The desire for someone to check in on him was overwhelming and made the escapes out to Roth more comparable to hikes in the desert than lustful shows, but Gerard liked the space that Frank occupied in his mind. He liked the little ecosystem that he lived in, how he decorated it, and now much it felt like home to be near him. He thought about what Ruth had told him, that he was every bit as human as anyone else he may pass by on the mile-long walk, and that he deserved love just as much as those same people who went by him on the phone to their boyfriends, but it just didn't feel right. Maybe cycles took longer to break than the preconceived notion that he had in his head, maybe he just needed someone to refresh the tab there so that he could get a fresh look at things. He wasn't going to be able to undo his feelings for Frank even if he tried with all his might, so he was left to settle in her words and find some peace of mind in the growing pressure in his stomach. 

Watching the way he moved really wasn't helping, so maybe just knowing that he was  _ there at all  _ even if he couldn't see him was what he needed. He felt this way all the time anyway: that he was just out of reach and unattainable because, out of everyone in the world, Gerard deserved him the least. Who was he possibly with that he didn't want him to see? He tried to make himself believe that perhaps Frank saw him as something more than a friend and that his flirtatiously drunk and high spirit was what his heart really pointed to, but deep down he was sure that he'd never be anything more than a spot at the coffee table and an awkward occasional buddy to come and drink all the bad wine.

The spring was finally unfolding its petals and shaking them off onto the ground to then fill the air like snow in the wind. Gerard didn't know why it was so damn windy all the time, but at least when he was pelted by leaves in the gusts, it wasn't dead silent like it had been several times on the nights where he sat here outside Frank's house so that he was forced to confront his thoughts and marinate in them, which, to starters and experienced thinkers alike, is a daunting task when you know there's a conclusion to be reached. The conclusion at hand: choose love and admit defeat; I am not a monster.

Tonight was another one of those nights. The air was totally still and the city slept deeply but the warm orange glow leaking through the gaps in Frank's curtains kept him awake. They may as well be the only ones whose eyes were open besides the dead in the entire town. Gerard sat pensive with his legs stretched out in front of him in the grass, plucking it blade by blade from the soil, counting each curly root as a representative of each nail he had to tear from his cement foundation, every little thing that he had to unlearn now that love was at the core of his Earth. He had to dig there himself and all he had was his own two hands and ten dirty, blood clotted fingernails.

Could Ruth have possibly been trying to pry into his mind to make him give up the instinct and the hunger for the humanity he hadn't encountered in over five years? Or could she just be right like everyone else probably was? Was he going to starve like her when he leaves his life behind for Frank? Would he have to leave his brother behind? Questions plagued his mind now and he couldn't shake them, nor could he answer them. What was behind the curtain? What was beyond his home? What were humans really like? He'd forgotten already. How sad, he had already drifted too far from the shore to ever swim back and had to relearn how to tread water all over again. He was doubtful that Ruth, someone who had been born a vampire, could teach him, since she had no real experience with mortality, but he certainly knew who could.

He saw Frank's hand peek through the space between the curtains in his front window and the side of his face appeared as he peered out of the glass. His eyes followed the stepping stone path of the dismal stars until he found the moon and he lingered on it for a moment. Gerard admired how he shined in the light of it, the soft curves in his face, his big, round eyes, and the gentle touches that the gods had laid all the way down his chest. His lips were parted so he could breathe through his mouth to make room for all of Gerard's longing for him that he couldn't see.

What a glorious sight he was, wavy, dark hair falling just above his shoulders, framing his sharpened- yet, somehow- soft jaw that made his smile as welcoming as it was. He looked just like a damn renaissance painting and Gerard wondered if he'd ever be able to make one himself and do him justice. His nose looked like it was the perfect shape to kiss and run a finger over while he slept just to get a loving grip on  _ something,  _ to lay next to him and feel no need for a blanket since just the sight of him was enough to warm him from the inside out. He wanted to sink into bed with him so badly that it made the desire more of a dream.

No sooner than he appeared did he vanish again, tearing the gold light from the grass that gave it so much life, so much color, plunging the forest around him into darkness again. If only the night were colder, then it would solidify the vastness of the lonely expanse that opened when Frank wasn't there. Gerard was forced to face it again.

He'd been attending the weekly meetings with the same consistency, alone, arriving early, and begging at least one person to listen to his inquiries about love and romance and dashing sex, but he was met with nothing more than scoffs and accusations that he must be some sort of newbie. He swore to them that he was turned five years ago but nothing sufficed, he was a hopeless romantic in that space and love was out of the question. He figured it was taboo at this place, a forbidden topic that he needed cleared more than anything else. He couldn't get a word out of Ruth when he could find her there, she seemed skittish and preoccupied whenever he did eventually snag her for a chat, answering his questions with empty 'I don't know's and shrugs. It was frustrating, as most things were, trying to make sense of something no one else has the blood to spew out. It was lonely enough to explain your desires to someone who hasn't felt them in centuries, so having to do so alone in a bundle of trees was worse than hell.

"Gee? Are you here?"

Gerard looked up to see Ray's signature curls lit in the moonlight. "What are you doing here?"

"I haven't heard your voice in a week and a half and it's an hour till sunrise." Ray sat down in the grass next to him. "I'm worried about you."

Gerard had to hold back from automatically replying that he's fine, because he seriously wasn't. He stayed silent.

"I'm just sorry." He said, looking at Gerard with sad eyes that he knew he wasn't going to look back at him with, fixed on Frank's front window even though his lights had been out for over an hour. "Neither of us have been there for you at all."

Gerard wasn't mad at him, he never really could be, but he usually brushed off Ray's apologies with reassurances he didn't have right now. After all, he wanted him to be sorry so that he could fix whatever went wrong and try to find where it all began to crash down, but the destruction was so massive, he didn't know where to start.

"I know how much you like him."

Gerard shifted his weight on the ground at that, trying to mask how giddy he made him feel just at the slightest mention.

"Ruth told you about love, didn't she?"

He nodded, finally acknowledging the progress he'd been meaning to make for over a month.

"I only hit it off with her because we had something in common, the reason it didn't work out is because I realized my feelings for Mikey were more than just best friendship and- well, you know the story. Anyway, it  _ is  _ possible, you know."

"Why didn't you tell me that sooner?" Gerard finally looked at Ray.  _ "Ruth  _ had to be the one to apologize for everyone being so quiet about it.  _ She  _ made more sense than any of you have and I've spoken to her like… twice. She's never even been human."

"It's conflicting, isn't it?"

Gerard wanted to roll his eyes at Ray's rhetoric, he was so damn good at getting inside his head and pushing his thoughts out, but he just stayed looking at him and tried to coerce them to release themselves on his own.

"You're gonna have to turn him sooner or later. We could use an extra pair of fangs for food around here, obviously." Ray narrowed his eyes at him, hinting at the full body's worth of now depleted supply of blood for him to dilute his alcohol with.

"I'm not gonna hurt him."

"Who says that it has to hurt?" 

Gerard squinted. "What the hell do you mean?"

"I mean… It's twenty times harder to turn someone by biting them because you can get carried away and drink them dry. It's a fine line that is mistakenly crossed way too often. It's easier to just get them to straight-up drink your blood." Ray stuck his hands out in front of him and his palms were gray in the moonlight.

"You can  _ do  _ that? I thought it was poison."

"Only if you're dead, which…" Ray waved his hands around to gesture at Gerard's current state of undead-ness. "It won't hurt him, unless he's some delicate flower with a sensitive tummy, then you might bruise his ego, but otherwise, a nice little elixir never ruined anybody's night."

"But… Ruth said she can't turn her girlfriend because it'll hurt her. I thought that since, you know, she's been a vampire for her whole life, that she'd at least know that. It's not the only way to do it?"

"Gerard, there are billions of ways to turn somebody into a vamp. You can make someone bloodthirsty if you look at them the wrong way." Ray chuckled to himself. "I didn't know she had a girlfriend."

"They've been dating for a year, she said. She really likes her."

Ray cocked his head to the side. "You said… You said that she wanted to  _ turn  _ her, right? So Ruth's girlfriend is human?"

"Yeah… that's basically the whole reason she told me that Frank was-"

"Essential information, Gerard Way." He sighed.

Gerard bit his lip. It was stupid how little effort it took to get him to feel hopeful about anything, contradicting his hopeless status, but it was astounding how much it meant to him when people actually  _ told  _ him things. This meant that there was some kind of chance for him and there was significant reason to support his coming here more often now.

"We need to get home now, okay? Sun should be up in a few." Ray put his heavy hand on Gerard's shoulder so that he would look at him again. "It'll be alright."

"I know."

"I'm sorry Mikey and I haven't been helpful  _ at all  _ lately. I'll talk to him tomorrow, we'll make it better." 

They stood up together and Gerard took one last look at the sleepy house. "I like him so much."

Neither of them said anything more as they returned down the stretch of empty road, walking swiftly to avoid the sunrise and the morning commute traffic that was due in half an hour's time. Gerard walked a little faster to release all the nervous, excited energy inside of him because he was finally getting what he wanted after all these years. After all the misery and isolation he'd trudged through, the night had never looked more promising. With each step, he could see Frank's image clearer and clearer until it seemed like he was right there beside him, hanging off of his body and breathing in his ear. He missed his heartbeat dearly. Gerard had never been more excited to see blood in his entire life.

-

Somehow, the resolution was far more dreary. Coming to the realization that there was value to be seen in Gerard's relationship with Frank made the time he spent alone and without him a daunting and haunting task to endure. His head ached and his hips were stiff from laying in bed all night, wondering how he could possibly make an excuse again. Frank didn't have his number and Gerard didn't have his, so there was no way to make an effort to go seek each other out unless one of them made the mile, which neither of them had. It really felt like the fire was slowly fading and there was no kindling in sight. A month long drought is more devastating to a heavily hydrated rainforest than one might think. There was something intoxicating in those trees, the lingering sweetness of the dried winter's leaves, the lick of oil remaining in a pine needle that's rubbed under chins, and the poisoning that coursed through his veins as the pulse on the other side of the road began to slow. Gerard wanted to chase that feeling again, that stumbling, stupid, drowsy drunkenness that made him feel like the only man in the entire world was Frank and no one could avert his eyes from him.

The first fingers of dawn poked through the streaky black paint and the thick crimson sheets. Gerard knew that he should have pulled the blankets over his head a long time ago, but he saw his skin in the pale light and couldn't bear to sleep without the searing pain behind his eyes. Something about the sensation of skin pulling and growing warm, tender and moist to the touch, gray turning ever pinker, made him aware of how delicately he trod the border that separated him from who he always will be and who he used to be. His feet moved in a double helix, twisting and coiling his DNA into some freakish mutant of love and hate. As each strand found its way around, he cycled with it, careening around corners to the chest-tightening need to feel the breath escape the man's lungs, little by little until his grip slowly loosens, and then back again to the front where the disgust hung in the very air he breathed because he wouldn't dare subject him to what he was dealing with now. What else was there besides this immortal immorality? What other attributes could be held but evil? How sick in the head this painted him; how dare he want so badly to bite down and feel the pop right after pining with all possessed might to sleep away the sun with him? That confliction never eased, he found, and no constant stream of affirmation cards could ever absorb the biohazard collected on the floor like weak little towelettes. 

It always did put him to sleep eventually, the heat seemed to feel like steam and sedated him so that he could wake up at the exact same time as he had for the past twelve days and resume the seeping of the tea first thing on the moon rise.

-

"Hey, Gerard." Ray tapped on Gerard's door as he opened it to bring him his coffee. 

He rolled over and tried to pull the blankets off of his face that weren't even there out of muscle memory. Gerard ran his finger over the back of his hand, admiring the pink pigment in his skin that made him look alive. The sun had polished and blushed him like a peach, remembering how soft his skin used to be, rosy and warm in the summer light. 

"Can I talk to you?" Ray asked, shutting it behind him for once and then setting the mug down on Gerard's nightstand.

"What about?" He rubbed his eyes and sat up in bed, watching the steam curl and dissipate.

"I wanted to tell you I'm sorry again. I wish I never let you believe that you were manipulating us, you weren't."

Gerard softened. "I understand."

"No, you don't." He replied, tilting his chin up but still gazing at the floor as he sat at the foot of the bed. "You don't have to be kind about things anymore. It's only hurting you more and if you don't ever face how mad it makes you, that trauma will never heal."

"Toro-"

"Just- I know you just woke up, and I know it's been weird lately, but… you can tell me how you really feel." Ray prepared himself for the typhoon of emotions that would come falling down the divots between the ridges inside of him so that he could properly stop them.

He hated how sudden this was, how awkward and forced and fucking  _ weird  _ it felt to acknowledge just what he'd been trying to ignore for all these years. He had never been comfortable taking accountability for anything his entire life, that was something he lacked in upbringing, but if he was gonna stay here, he had to get used to it and better at it. Ray really did mean what he said, the longer Gerard refused to talk to him the more shitty he felt, and it was getting harder and harder to pretend like what was happening wasn't happening: the house and their little sorta-family now had no idea where their next meal was going to come from and had to devise a plan for whether they were going to get one or get another person to help get one. He'd never been faced with this issue before, he hadn't really depended on anyone to fulfill his hunger because if they fell through or the feed got away from them, he just turned the corner and pulled the first person off into the trees to fix the problem, but now that there was a major tone of uncertainty within their group, he now had to consider this for the first time. Was it every man for himself? How would Mikey feed? What would Gerard eat? Ray wasn't really too concerned about his own situation, he could just do what he always did, mentioned before, and fend for himself, he had at least half a reserve left if worse came to worse. He just saw Mikey's nervous eyes and the muddy streak in them and knew that if anyone was going to provide for him, he had to provide for them first. If change was to come about, there had to be a kick-starting incentive.

"You know how I feel." Gerard sipped the coffee after blowing on it for a bit.

"You're right, I do. I talked to Mikey while you were sleeping and he-"

"Doesn't want to talk to me? He never does anymore. Ever since Ruth came over, he won't listen to a word I say."

Ray bit his tongue. He knew exactly why he wouldn't, it was another thing that he kept inside and only let out for him to see and pet its fur, but he couldn't stomach revealing its sharp teeth to Gerard without the brothers dueling it out themselves. He promised he'd never tell, anyway.

"I miss him. I just want someone to tell me something." The desperation in Gerard's voice made it shake a little and Ray jerked his head up to look at him in all his sun-kissed glory.

"Dude, how late were you up last night?" He poked his shoulder and watched the pale, white oval fade into pink.

"Eight in the morning." He mumbled, looking past Ray at what darkness was outside the glass. "Something isn't right."

_ Obviously,  _ Ray thought, wanting to widen his eyes and shrug at how tightly they'd all been meaning to grasp at that for months now.

"There's something major that he doesn't want me to know that's keeping us from getting past the first place on the map. Why doesn't Ruth wanna see Mikey?" Gerard took a long sip and filled his cheeks with coffee, swallowing it little by little.

Ray stayed silent, scouring for ways he could look less conspicuous in his secret-holding.

"I'm this fucking close to going to Frank's house and calling it a day." He cleared his throat and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He'd accidentally slept in his jeans… again.

"What's holding you back?" Ray beckoned, relieved by the change in subject and that Gerard's question was more of a rhetorical one.

"Being alone." He stood up and finished his drink, setting it back on the little table. "But I honestly don't even care anymore."

"I could go with you?" Ray stayed put and watched Gerard pull the first black shirt out of his closet and wrangle it over his shoulders.

"You don't have to. Clearly you're more of a conversationalist back here." He remarked, smoothing the folds and wrinkles in the fabric with his warm hands and humming a bit to himself. "I look like a person with these burns."

"Yeah, almost."

Gerard walked out into the living room, where Mikey was sitting on the sofa by the door, reading a book he'd already read twice before. He didn't even look up as Gerard slipped his shoes on, standing right in front of him.

"Well, Ray," Gerard started, tightening the knot on his right shoe and leaning against the wall literally inches from Mikey. "It isn't stopping me anymore."

He opened the door and Mikey didn't even blink. He held his breath, of course, but didn't react to Gerard's goodbye. He turned the page right as the latch clicked.

Ray sat down next to him and tried to catch up to the line he was on. "You know we're gonna have to tell him eventually, right?"

"I know." Mikey said, sticking his thumb in between the pages as he searched for his bookmark. "But that's the last thing he needs to know right now. He's dealing with enough."

Ray let his head relax against his shoulder and Mikey kissed his nose. 

"Come back to bed, love, so are you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	12. xii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's vamp day!!! i'm really excited to share this chapter with you guys so i really hope you enjoy reading it just as much as i enjoyed writing it.
> 
> school has been a hassle and a half lately, so it's been hard for me to get into the writing groove, but i'm slowly getting back into it little by little and i'm very thankful to have all the content stored up beforehand. it makes it easier. being ahead is a blessing.
> 
> i would like to give a special thankyou shoutout to my friend koi on twitter for hyping me up and being so sweet about my writing, i really appreciate it. it makes this beast of a slow burn easier to tackle.
> 
> anyway!!! here's the chapter you came for!! thanks for nearly 900 views!!
> 
> follow me!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

With no hesitation, Gerard knocked on Frank's front door. He could hear music playing softly inside, the TV was on but muted, and the lighting looked dim. He couldn't pick out quite what type of music it was, but he figured he would soon find out.

Frank opened the door and his face lit up. "Gerard! I've been missing you, man." He was dressed in a black muscle tank and his jeans were tight, gray, and acid washed, sitting low on his waist. A single silver ball chain was dangling loosely from his neck.

Gerard had never seen a friendlier face, inviting him in with open arms to pass through the door and into the thralls of everything he'd ever wanted. Acoustic guitar sang gently over the speakers, sounding romantic and Italian and so disgustingly Catholic that it almost made his sweet tooth ache. He listened to Frank hum along to it under his breath as he locked the door and found his way next to him on the floor, breathing heavily with his eyes closed.  _ Thank God  _ he never said anything, Gerard thought, processing that he  _ had  _ really missed him and his cupidity wasn't just a play on how badly he wanted to be shot with an arrow.

"Where's your buddies?" He asked, crossing his leg over the other.

"They uh- they stayed at home. I just needed to get out of the house." Gerard squeezed his fists and focused on the stabbing feeling of his nails that he should have trimmed a week ago in his itchy palms.

"Were they being gross and gay again?"

Gerard widened his eyes.  _ "Couples."  _

Frank laughed softly before getting up to obsessively pick at his basil plant that had nearly doubled in size since the last time Gerard had seen it. He stuffed one of the leaves in his mouth. "So, what's on your mind?"

He thought about it for a little bit. He really didn't know how much more he could elaborate on just how badly he felt he needed to be here without sounding suspicious as shit or creepier than he already thought he was, but he shrugged anyway. "Just missed the company, I guess,"

"I get that." He couldn't have returned to him any slower, even if time started to go backwards. "I was actually planning on going to yours soon, anyway. Good to know we're on the same wavelength."

"Yeah…" Gerard's stomach flipped as he hid his smile. He missed him, thought about him, wanted to see him,  _ liked being around him,  _ and it made him feel ill. He was dizzy with how happy it made him, how close he was to him, how dearly beloved he appeared to be in his timeline. 

"What do you wanna do?" Frank rolled his head toward him, bright eyes glowing brighter at the change of songs, and he looked just as beautiful as he always had. 

Gerard noticed the empty space on his left arm where his skin was fresh and un-inked, contrast to his other arm that was decently filled up, and his neck that looked like a Christmas cookie platter just waiting for grubby little fingers to devour it. The way his bangs fell into his eyes on one side and out of the way on the other side, both masking and exposing his long lashes and the deep, shadowed wells that his eyes were anchored in. Oh, how long he could stare at those spots and admire how wonderfully his skin seemed to dance there when he smiled.

"I hadn't even thought of that." He admitted, before returning to taking in as much of Frank's face as he could.

"Me neither." He paused, doing the same but much less purposefully, his lids shut as he let his vision fall to the floor. He tapped his nails on the coffee table in front of him, trying to conjure up an idea. 

Gerard had to bite down on his tongue to keep from asking him if he could dance with him in the space between the kitchen and the living room, head pressed to his shoulder and fingers intertwined while the others rest on his hip, because he wanted that more than anything, to feel his body heat mix with his own in a slurry of noxious cocktail dreams, dizzy and so close to the surface of the magnet that it almost pulled his spine out of socket.

_ I know what we could do…  _ He sang in his mind,  _ I want you to touch me, just a finger…  _ He pressed his tongue against the roof of his mouth so that his fangs didn't have a chance to even start. They were next to each other and facing the forest outside the front window, but Gerard wasn't looking at the trees, scanning for yellow eyes like he usually did, he was set on the side of Frank's face as he thought and thought. He was gorgeous like that, his pupils dove far into his hazel eyes, shiny like his piercings that Gerard kept forgetting were there. He thought it was funny how incredibly he drew to him, how he encased him in his cage that was made of silk and velvet that he never wanted to find out how to escape from. What a wonderful spell.

"I know what we could do…" Frank immediately got up, shut the TV screen off along with every light and sound in the house until the only thing they could sense was the quiet movement of the trees outside. He sat back down next to Gerard and pointed out the window. "Sometimes deer come right up to the glass. They like my plants, apparently, or the music, whatever. We can watch for them if you want."

"I'd fucking love that." 

And so they stayed there, in total silence, watching for deer in the empty spring woods. Frank would lean into the table and relax his shoulders, and Gerard would completely lose himself in him. He had never been more grateful for stellar night vision than he was in that moment. His shoulder blades poked out of his shirt like cartoon mountain peaks, sharp at the corners and saturnine like the coldest of blizzards were held there at the crests. One day he'd scale them, let his fingers hike the altitude and scrape down the descent, marking every inch of him as a mile in the journal. He was going to set records with his trailblazer-ship and appreciate every step it took to earn that title.

"That little bird right there is called a tufted titmouse." Frank pointed at a small, silver bird that sat on the lone fence post that was visible from the window, but Gerard couldn't find it. He'd been too distracted by staring at how his back looked in his clothes to pay any attention to where his hands were. "Best animal name ever."

"Where?" He actually spotted it this time, its feathers were rather bright under the moon, but he waited for him to lean in and guide him along.

Frank did just that and picked his hand up in his own so that the tops of his knuckles were just under the creature. He leaned in right next to his face to make sure they were getting the same view.

And Gerard could kiss him right now. He could lace his fingers in his own and pull him in, feel his hot breath against his face and then find out what his soft lips tasted like. He could have kissed him, but he didn't. He just remained there, stuck in time, listening to his hushed breathing in his ear and his tender voice. The sensation of holding his hand was one that he missed so dearly, soothing and golden like the color the stars wished they were. Their palms were flush against each other and the solid ridges in Frank's hand made Gerard want to read his lines in the future; another thing to add to the list. He'd skip the weekly gatherings again for this in a heartbeat.

"Aw, I see it. Sweet thing." The bird was smaller than Gerard's hand, he was sure of it, one that he could hold in both of them until it fell asleep. It really showed how badly he wanted to care for and nurture something helpless that wasn't someone he lived with.

Speaking of nursing birds, he thought of Rosemary, of Ruth, and how madly in love they must be, how crazy she must make Ruth to the point where she now has to make plans to turn her, to be with her forever, and it made sense. He understood that longing, that unending bond that he now had no desire to push away anymore. Gerard had missed him and Frank missed him right back, maybe he even thought of him as a friend. He knew without a doubt that that was where the two of them were going to end up, but there was no way he was letting Frank, that delicate, sugar sweet thing, into the decimated life that Gerard had been soaking in lately. If even the thought of him being slightly uncomfortable made him want to bleed, he couldn't imagine bringing him into a world as cruel as his. Hell, he didn't even know how to tell him that he was a whole entire vampire and so was everyone he had already grown considerably attached to, or if he wanted to at all. If he was gonna trust him with anything, he had to, but with all the protections and Bible thumping promises he had in his life, that would flush everything he wanted to die for down the drain. And that would surely kill him once and for all, better than any stake or any silver bullet could ever do.

Frank set Gerard's hand down on the coffee table and traced his finger down a bulging vein from the back of his wrist to his ring finger. "This is weird but, your hands look so strong."

Gerard smiled at him, beaming at the touch in the dark. "Thank you, they're not."

Frank laughed. That blasted laugh, the one that was going to drive Gerard off his rocker. It was one that brought the entire Earth to harmony, holding hands, and afraid to stop talking in case it stopped. "I like you, Gerard, you're a good friend to have around so far."

His stomach flipped again. "So far? Shit man, I hope I don't fuck it up." He laughed nervously, keeping his 'I like you too, so much, much more than you could ever imagine' inside his head instead of out on the surface of his tongue.

"No, no, don't worry. You never could."

As soon as he felt him lean into him again, and as soon as he felt his heart leap into his throat again to keep from moving a single hair on his body, Frank took his finger off of Gerard's hand and pointed it at the very edge of the woods. "Buck!" He whispered.

And there it was, a more majestic stag than Gerard had seen in a long time, slowly walking along the trail in the grass that he knew all too well. Its eyes were just barely luminous in the night, but he saw them, and he saw the beauty in them. Its antlers rose above its soft, furry face and it looked so peaceful and fine with having literal bone growing out of its head. Gerard hoped that he could one day reach that level of tranquility.

Frank was gleaming at the sight of the animal, smiling ear to ear and whispering things Gerard couldn't quite hear as it roamed closer to the bed of grass that couldn't be trimmed because it was too close to the siding of the house and the single pane of glass that separated the two of them from the wide open outdoors.

Gerard moved slightly closer to him to hear his remarks and he didn't regret it.

"Look at you, beautiful thing. Not a care in the world, just as you were made to think of nothing, you achieve every natural order laid out for you, and you don't even know why. Look how close he is, Gerard, isn't he pretty?"

"He is."

"What a lovely animal. Don't you love them?"

"I do."

At this point, he could lay his head on his shoulder and Frank probably wouldn't notice, but he wouldn't dare disturb the peace he was in and how happy it made him. Instead, he just kept track of his hair on his cheek and his tiny voice that made him like a fawn: gentle, majestic, quiet, haunting him like a wraith by showing up silently and grazing off of the freshness that still somehow remained in his heart.

The deer bent its head down just before the window and nipped at the tall weeds and grass there, and Frank held his breath. He grabbed onto Gerard's hand that was still sitting on the table where he left it. He didn't have to say anything, he just looked at him with enthusiastic eyes and that was when Gerard knew that he wouldn't want to live any other way. 

When it lifted its head up and blinked at them a couple times, Gerard was sure that Frank would pass out from the lack of oxygen going to his brain. He squeezed his hand until he heard him take a breath in. The animal returned to grazing and did this a few times until it was satisfied and walked away, back into the woods again. Frank finally gasped.

"Did you see that? That was fucking awesome!" He still held on to his hand and they exchanged amazed looks. "I'm so glad you came, I would not have been able to handle that if I was home alone."

"Celestial timing, right?" Gerard snuck a swipe of his thumb over one of Frank's knuckles and he didn't notice.

Frank's smile was ravishing in the darkness and Gerard felt a sense of pride in being the only one who could see it. It pushed his eyes shut and he couldn't quite sit still, his lips looked so smooth. One day he'd kiss them, Gerard thought, but not now, not yet, he'd find a time. This closeness was so intimate and fragile that it was like holding a bubble in the palm of your hand, careful not to make any sudden movements for fear of popping it. Gerard watched the future play in the reflections of the iridescence and patiently awaited the next scene of the movie.

He felt his own hand drop softly onto his thigh and it felt cold without Frank's touch. Again, he awaited the next passing cut in the film.

"I need a drink." Frank said, brushing against Gerard's side as he regained his footing to bound to the kitchen.   
"Ditto." He said, turning over his shoulder to watch his body move with more glee than Gerard had seen in a while. It was refreshing to see someone so happy.

"This wine is so good." He poured a couple glasses fuller than they needed to be and jammed the cork back in as far as he could. "I'm glad I get to share another thing with you."

"I'm happy to be here to witness it." That was an understatement.

"Here's to making my entire year, a new friend." Frank raised his glass, sitting next to Gerard again, but not as close.

"Cheers." The glasses clinked and they both sank considerable portions, moaning at how good it tasted. It was a rich, red wine and, in some impossible way, even more luscious than the intoxication he nearly threw up last time he was here.

"Please don't ever leave." Frank looked at him and met his eyes. Gerard was already staring at him.

"Don't worry, I won't want to miss another thing."

_ You're so fucking hot when you're happy. _

Gerard wished he could explain how alcohol made him so horny, just a few sips in and he already wanted to hook up with him more than he ever had, but he stayed quiet, shutting it deep inside his mind to deal with  _ later,  _ looking away from him and back out the window. He could still see the deer's white tail shake off in the distance, it hadn't fully disappeared yet, so he focused on that until his eyelids grew heavy enough that his pulse relaxed. He couldn't get hungover, he figured that out, but being drunk in the moment was serene if he got the balance right. Too little and his libido turns him into some kind of maniac, too much and he's so nauseous he can't stand. But right here in the middle, though, he was completely fine with everything and wholly okay with anticipating falling asleep on him long enough for him to drive him home. It wasn't even midnight yet and he had already pushed possibilities for the rest of the night out and away to make room for the present moment so that it could last forever.

He kept his pretty little mouth shut though, because despite how much love he felt, it could ruin how well things were going with a single slip. He would let the locked bathroom door hear this story instead. It sure was an ethereal one, too. It was no fun having to keep something of that honor to himself, but at least it would be safer than letting his heart beat out of his chest while he pinned him to the floor right before he caught on. The insurance was worth the discomfort.

"What do you have planned tomorrow?" Frank asked as he stood up slowly to turn on a dim lamp by one of his bookshelves.

"Not sure-"

"Do you wanna hang out tomorrow?" Frank looked light again, the fire-color made him look soft in the space between them.

"I would love to, how about-"

"We could go to this park- it's on the other side of town, so it's kind of a pain in the ass to get to- but I can pick you up and drive us there. What do you think?"

Gerard smiled to himself and finished the last of his wine. 'I could pick  _ you  _ up…' His heart skipped a beat at the implication that he wanted to be alone with him again. "Sounds like a plan."

"It's a plan, then. How about six-thirty, we can watch the sunset… or whatever, smoke, feed the ducks…" Frank's palms were upturned at the options he listed out.

"That works." Gerard winced at the time. He'd have to get up while the sun was still up and find a way to not reek like sunblock. Maybe he'd understand, or maybe he'd just slather himself in rosemary so he wouldn't notice it. He'd figure it out.

"I'll see you then, but until tomorrow, I wanna hear about you. Tell me your stupid shit- if you want, of course." Frank scooted to the other side of the coffee table so that he was across from Gerard and rested his chin on his hand.

He mirrored him and tried not to stare into his eyes. "I can't think of anything I'd want more."

Frank settled into his seat a foot and a half from him, melting into the tabletop with the stem of his wine glass between two of his fingers. Gerard thought he felt so far away.

"I'm 25, I've lived with my brother and my best friend for five years now…" He trailed off, suddenly realizing that he really didn't know shit about himself.

"Come on…" Frank whined. "What's your favorite color, a movie that makes you laugh, your pet peeves? Guilty pleasures, the places where your back always hurts, words that are stuck in your head? Come on, Gerard, you gotta know yourself better than that."

"You go first then." He sighed, desperately leafing through the file cabinet in his brain to look for the documents he'd written those things down on. "I wanna see what I'm up against." Gerard really wished he was  _ literally  _ up against him, but that was another conversation.

"Okay… I'm 20, I've lived alone for about two years, and my favorite color is teal. I laugh at 45 Meters Down because it's just  _ so fucking bad,  _ and I hate when people slam doors, kick walls, basically everything that everyone does when you share walls."

"Oh my God, the worst." Gerard let his palm slap lightly on the table.

"Right?" He grinned a little as he talked, looking up intermittently at Gerard and picking the corner of his mouth up each time. "I'm slightly embarrassed about this, it's gross, but my guilty pleasure is that microwaveable mac-n-cheese with the powder-"

"What the hell do you mean  _ gross?  _ Those things are fucking good."

"Looks like this is gonna turn out okay: you and me." Frank looked in his eyes this time and Gerard's stomach fell off the balance beam.

"I hope so." He mumbled.

"My back hurts in the same exact place every single day-" He twisted his torso around and slapped his hand right between his shoulder blades. "I've never known pain as bad as this."

It was starting to freak Gerard out how much they had in common, he was so used to being the odd one out that no one could relate to since he was a vampire, for Christ's sake. It was refreshing to agree on something for once.

"Do you ever get the word  _ guts  _ stuck in your head?" Frank asked. "If you say it really fast over and over again, it sounds like  _ Scott, Scott, Scott, Scott,  _ doesn't it? Do either of us even  _ know  _ a Scott?"

Gerard shook his head. "Who the hell names their kid that?" He giggled.

"Old, rich people." He seemed to shudder. "Anyway, your turn."

He bit the inside of his cheek. He was starting to remember things, but he had to guess on most of the questions. "I like red, I guess, or black, and Mikey and I like Star Wars a lot-"

"Nerd." Frank spoke out of one side of his mouth and just under his breath. Gerard didn't hear him.

"I hate when people don't tell me things, you know? They just expect you to know everything."

"Oh my God," Frank rolled his eyes back. "I fucking hate that."

Gerard smiled. He wanted to drool on and on to him about the setbacks in the past month and how much they ticked him off, but he pushed out a muffled laugh and raised his eyebrows a bit. He hated being this nervous, and the longer Frank stared at him, the closer that feeling crept up on him, raising the hairs on the back of his neck. He also couldn't say that his guilty pleasure was literally just a glass of rum diluted with human blood, so he thought one up on the spot. "My guilty pleasure is… painting. Yeah."

"Dude, no way. You paint? You gotta show me your art sometime."

Gerard wasn't sure how much longer he could contain his blush. He was already smiling like an idiot. "Yeah, I will, for sure." He swallowed his spit and reached for the same spot on his back that Frank had just talked about. "It hurts here too."

"You have shitty posture too?" Frank drank a bit of his wine that he'd been spinning in the glass.

"I've seen seahorses with straighter spines."

Frank's smoky laugh came again, he was one to throw his head back but keep his eyes locked right where they were before, following your every move like some scrutinizing tracker that you pushed to the bottom of your pocket so that you could show someone later that you'd walked around the supermarket in the shape of a heart.

"What's your word?" Frank asked.

_ Kiss, blood, love,  _ all of these came to mind but they weren't safe enough. "Pine." He settled, glancing up at the tall, swaying trees that reached up to poke at the stars so that the planets had poles to dance around.

"Sensible choice." Frank said, finishing his drink and pushing the empty glass away from him. "Now what?"

_ Let's make out,  _ he thought, seeing no better time than now to stand him up and push him against the backing of the armchair just to his side.

"Oh, you would  _ not  _ believe the paranormal shit I've got in this house, man."

Part of him felt disappointed, but the other part was relieved that he didn't have to wallow in his neediness while the air hung silent around them. "Is that so?"

"My Bible keeps flying off the shelf, I don't know if it's not level, or I'm not setting it down right, but it's fucking creepy. That rosary over there just swings on its own sometimes."

He kept a shit-eating grin down. "Jesus-"

"Tell Him about it, He won't listen to me." He joked. "Ah, I probably shouldn't say that."

"It's okay man, He's just giving you a little show, you know? Man's gotta get bored up there."

"Maybe you're right about that." Frank looked behind Gerard at the red beads that were still neatly hanging on the hook to the right of the garden door. "I'm sure He's got a vendetta against me, anyway."

Gerard didn't ask why. He knew the reason, because he had the same one and triple down.

"I've gone to the church, I've had this place blessed, I put fucking  _ seeds  _ on my roof, I pray, like…" He waved his hands around in the air. "The fuck did I do?"

"Seriously." Gerard agreed, returning to the old room inside of his brain that he grew up in, writing scrawled on the walls penning that no matter what he did to appease Him, He'd never care enough to take him out of the misery. He only sunk him deeper into it. At 20, and- honestly, far before that, Gerard was sure that, if there was a God, He wouldn't have let Mikey do what he'd done so that the two of them suffered like they had and still were. 

"Oh well, I try, Gerard, I really do." Frank sighed.

"I'm sure you do." He looked up at him again, begging to get that closeness, that kind, affectionate distance and crumple it in his hand so that the corners could meet. "And I'm sure that it's enough."

"Thanks." He breathed.

It was quiet for a beat, the absence of music on the speakers made it harder than it needed to be. There really wasn't any way but down from here, either he coaxed him closer to him and gave into his selfish, mushy desires, or he let himself go into the night again to wait for tomorrow.

"I should go." He really wished he hadn't said that, because right when he did, Frank crawled over the floor to sit next to him again. He could tell that he didn't want him to, but he felt trapped here not being able to show him all his wants. "It's late." It was, well enough past midnight that the world outside appeared to droop.

"I'll take you home."

They walked out to the car again, the air was stiller than it had been in a while and the sky was low with clouds. Gerard buckled himself into the passenger seat and looked out the window at the orange streetlights that bled onto the clouds off in the distance. He missed that rusty, coagulated color. They stayed in silence for a good part of the trip, Frank was humming a song under his breath as he drove just as slowly as he had before.

"Thanks for doing this, Gerard." He paused as he looked around a turn. "I'm glad we got to watch the animals together."

"Of course, I'm glad we got to be together." He cringed at the last part, hoping that he didn't pick up on his lonely attempt at appreciation.

"So am I." He pulled into the driveway unexpectedly quick. "I'll see you tomorrow, right?"

"Yes, you will."

Frank had his hand resting on the shifter and somehow grazed Gerard's thigh on his way to stick it out for him to shake it. "Oh, sorry." He mumbled.

Gerard's breath hitched. "It's okay." He took his hand and went stiff to hide his shaking limbs.

"I'll see you in a few."

"Bye, Frank."

"Bye."

Gerard opened the car door and stood on the porch, watching him, as he pulled away and around the corner of the hedges. Then, he was gone and he sat down on the steps to collect his things. He couldn't have cut the tension with the sharpest sword, nor could he have shattered it with Thor's hammer. All he fucking wanted was to climb on top of him in his seat and feel his body move underneath him, hands in his long hair, under his shirt, in his pants-  _ fuck.  _ He almost ran down the street after him to get just that, but the time wasn't right anymore. He was without him for at least five more hours until he fell asleep, and then it was first thing tomorrow evening. The clock was ticking miserably slow.

Gerard had no idea when he'd ever kiss him, but he hoped that it would come soon. He stood up, opened the front door, and found the house empty. He ran straight to his room and pushed a chair under the knob.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	13. xiii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's vamp day ! i'm so excited to show you guys this chapter, i have rewritten it at least twice and totally flipped it around but i'm happy with the final result!!! i hope you are too :]
> 
> thank you for all the lovely comments, kudos, and hits on this fic, it's really cool to see it so close to 1k. i started this project because of an idea in my head and didn't expect it to become such a big part of my life. it's going to last a long time and i'm really happy about that. <3
> 
> socialz!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

"Ow!" Gerard flinched. "Why are your hands so cold, and why are you using your nails?"

Mikey rested his hands on his shoulders. "This was your idea, man. Not my fault you woke me up to force me to do this."

"Maybe not, but you could've warmed your hands up for like a minute before you clawed at my face." He shivered and wrung his own hands out in his lap.

Mikey didn't say anything, squeezing another dime shaped dollop of greasy SPF out into his palm.

"What are you two gonna do here alone?" Gerard was obviously just speaking to fill time and ignore how fast his breathing was going, stinging in the back of his throat. No one answered his question.

"You just… you just  _ walked  _ into his house and he let you stay? And then he invited you to hang out  _ alone? Again?" _ Ray couldn't help but pull the loose strands of Mikey's bedhead hair that stuck straight out from his spot on the arm of the sofa behind where Mikey was standing.

"Yeah… I don't know what you want me to say." He twitched at Mikey's frigid fingers again. "I think there's-"

"No-" Mikey started, but he shut his mouth before he could tense the situation more than it was already growing to be. Even though it wasn't his intention when he'd first spoken, it shut Gerard up and the room was hanging low like it had been before. "Sorry."

"What if there  _ is?"  _

"What?" Ray asked, earning himself a snapping look from Mikey over his shoulder. He ignored it.

_ "Something."  _ He stared off at the photograph of Frank above his head and no one could see how big his eyes were, dreamily distant in the space between wherever his car was now.

"Then that's your monkey to toss off your back." Mikey handed Gerard his shirt- well, more like dropped it on his lap- and popped the cap back on the bottle.

Gerard could hear the distinct squishing of rubber on the cracked, gravelly cement outside the house and pulled the plain black tee over his shoulders. His skin crawled with the texture of the cotton and polyester against the oily sheen on his neck so he hoped that Frank wouldn't move like a bullet train and kiss his face for fear of tasting the beachy saltiness of his pores as the sun went down and they were sitting in the shade. He stood up in a rush and declined the mug of coffee set out for him on the table on the other side of the room and instead stole the glass from Ray's hand and downed the shot-worth of vodka inside of it before trotting to the door. He took one last look at Mikey and Ray, who both had their lips sucked into their mouths.

"Don't die." Mikey pushed out. He looked like he didn't want to say anything at all.

"Love you too, Mikey." The door shut after a square of light filled the entryway and vanished.

Gerard could see Frank waving at him through his dirty, tinted window. He stood and absorbed the appropriately spring evening air for a second, squinting in the daylight. He hadn't been out this early in forever.

Gerard resigned to the passenger seat and felt Mikey and Ray's eyes on the side of his face as he exchanged a friendly handshake with Frank. Before there was time for an awkward silence, he was already driving off, and the feeling quickly faded.

"How was your day?" Frank asked, finally accelerating over 30 for the first time through the rush hour traffic.

Gerard scrambled for a response somewhere, trying to maybe conjure something up about whatever he used to do during the day that would sound normal and mundane enough to move the conversation to Frank so that he could hear him talk. "Oh, you know… the usual. I guess I'm surviving." He gulped.

"Tell me about it." Frank sighed, ticking his turn signal to the right and passing a particularly slow minivan. "I didn't even drink at all today, I wanted to be fresh for you."

Gerard's heart skipped a beat. "Wish I could say the same." It was getting harder and harder to assume that there  _ wasn't  _ something there, the tang in Frank's words didn't taste like cotton candy anymore, they were straight moonshine now and he was gonna black out in a minute and forty-nine seconds. 

"I had you last night, didn't I?" He giggled and looked at him for a second. Frank's eyes met his and time turned to velvet.

"Definitely…" Gerard trailed off, hoping he'd catch his drift and follow the lead he was desperately trying to lay down in the sand. There was a line pointing directly to his belt buckle and he hoped to God that he wouldn't step on it.

Frank didn't say anything else. He looked like he knew how Gerard was doing, what he was thinking, what he wanted out of this trip, he looked like he knew him inside and out and there was no telling how far his eyes could go. Gerard spent this time scanning him up and down while he had his back turned, peering into turns and swinging his head around to look out the window. Seriously, how many blind turns were in this town? He really wished that one of them would come up with something, though, because it was getting hotter in that car than he was comfortable with and sitting with his left leg crossed over his right was starting to make him squirm. 

Frank was in  _ shorts,  _ his legs were sculpted and strong and freckled and he had one tiny tattoo on one of his calves that Gerard could see. It was St. Peter's cross and it looked like a stick and poke. He was wearing that ball chain again like he was asking for Gerard to grab it and pull on it so his neck would stick out. He was wearing the same muscle tank that he was in last night, looking like he'd been hoping Gerard wouldn't notice, even though he really did, taking extra time to dwell on how much skin he was showing and how soft it looked. 

"Okay…" Frank drew out the word as he finally pulled into an old parking lot filled with cracks and tall weeds in the heavily gravelled asphalt. The grass around it was dry and beige but slowly became greener and fuller as the ground sloped into the shore of the pond. The cattails hid the ducks and turtles in their quiet, rarely disturbed seclusion. "Trust me." 

Gerard looked over at him again as he shut the ignition off. He wondered if he really did and if he could try tonight. 

Frank got out of the car and slung a backpack onto one of his shoulders. Gerard could hear liquid sloshing around in it and a pint of blood rushed to his face. He followed Frank down a narrow, uneven sidewalk to a patch of thick grass next to a maple tree that had just started to get its leaves back. There was not a single soul in sight and the sun was positioned perfectly in front of them, already beginning to melt into the water that lapped at the limestone rocks. Gerard watched him pull a maroon colored towel out of the backpack and unroll it to reveal the same bottle of wine they'd shared last night, and he flattened the towel out in the grass to sit on one end of it, motioning for Gerard to sit next to him. 

"Bottoms up." Frank said, taking a swig directly from the bottle and handing it to him. 

Gerard didn't want to sit there figuring out how to waterfall red wine and make him wait on such a gorgeous evening, so he put his lips on the opening and filled up his mouth until he was sure it would slow him down and shut him up. Frank sat with his legs outstretched in front of him and his hands on either side of his hips, closer to the middle of the makeshift picnic blanket than the right side so that when Gerard fidgeted with his hair or his skin or his clothes, he laid his hand on top of Frank's, jumping and apologizing each time. 

"Dude, it's okay. You can just say so." He picked up Gerard's hand and held it in his own. 

Great, he thought, now he was  _ really _ held down. His body was going fifty thousand miles a second, trying to make sense of what was happening before he did something stupid to fuck it up: sitting on the banks of a pond under a tree, watching the sunset, drinking, and listening to the ducks quack with this dashingly beautiful boy that was now holding his hand- it was all too much. He had to force himself to breathe. Gerard must have looked disconcerted, because he could've sworn he felt Frank's thumb swipe over his knuckle, or maybe it was just a ripple or a twitch in the skin there from the touch that was making him anxious. He was trying his goddamn best to stay afloat. 

"You know what?" Frank kept hold of Gerard's hand as he drank again. "Can I ask you something?" 

_ Oh God…  _ Gerard panicked, here it comes. He didn't really know what he was expecting, but he wasn't sure how much longer he could just simply listen to him without making some sort of move. Frank didn't necessarily wait for an answer. 

"What do you think I should do about my problem? I think there's either vampires in the woods across the street from my house, or one of the kids who always parties in the lot next door to me has a blood kink and the password to my alarm system."

Gerard instinctively shrugged. "Whatever my brother told you about us being Catholic was a lie." He sighed. "I don't know shit." He almost added  _ babe _ onto the end of the remark but stopped himself just in time. 

"That was obvious, kid." Frank rolled his head to meet Gerard's eyes again and Gerard felt drunk after one sip. "You're no saint."

Goddammit, he could kiss him. He could kiss him and no one would fucking see, it wouldn't matter, the Earth would keep spinning and the sun would keep setting, and then it would rise again. Did he really care about this hesitation anymore? He sure as hell fucking loved how suave Frank was getting with him already, how much different his dying clock was from his never-dying one, and how Gerard's eyes always found Frank's, despite all the spots in them. He could get sick over how he was looking at him, starting at his shoes that were neatly crossed over each other and slowly up till they found his face like he wanted to. He could get sick over Frank pitching his chin up when he did this, smirking at how he watched his body flow when it was free enough to see all of it, he could get sicker over how he started to copy him and linger on his hips for a split second more than what Gerard felt was normal for friends who had only been around each other three times. He could faint over how easy it was. 

"You have no idea. Just go with your gut, Frank." God, he wished he could say the same for himself and make himself believe it, if he actually went by the advice that he gave and trusted his intuition from the get-go, he'd have bitten Frank and fucking devoured him with his eyes like a crooked gullet the first time they'd met. If he took his desires literally, he'd have sucked bruises into every single inch of him by now and filled in the spots he'd missed. If Gerard were to actually go with his gut, he'd push Frank onto his back and kiss him right now. Thankfully, his mind was a little better than a drought stricken desert and had some streams running through it still. There was life to be seen, and control to be taken.

"I guess you're right, I just can't pinpoint where to go next or what to do. It's terrifying, you know?" He looked like he wanted to shrink and Gerard switched gears. 

He was still holding Frank's hand, so he squeezed it. "You'll figure it out. I know how this feels."

Frank didn't say anything, but he looked slightly comforted. 

Gerard felt a twang of guilt stab at his stomach. His mind was a tornado tonight, spinning so fast that he was losing track of what he had and hadn't thought already, discovering things about Frank all over again. He hated that he scared him, as much of a rush that it gave him, the last thing he wanted was to push him away when he revealed that he was the source of all his fear. He took the bottle from him and drank. The glass was warm from his hands around it and it felt like he was touching even more than he felt he deserved, so he put it down in between them, nestling it into the grass beneath the towel so that it wouldn't tip. 

"Sorry, that was a stupid question." Frank let go of Gerard's hand and rubbed the bridge of his nose. 

"No, it wasn't." Gerard sandwiched his right hand in between his thighs. "What are you talking about?" 

"Nothing, just worked up about it, I guess." He didn't continue, but Gerard got all he needed to know.

"Okay, well, you can talk to me about it whenever you want. I promise you, it's not stupid." He rubbed hearts into a hand that wasn't there. 

"Alright, you don't have my number yet, do you?" Frank pulled a conveniently sized, crumpled up slip of notebook paper from the first pocket he checked in his bag, already pre-filled in with his phone number in blue ink. "Here."

"I do now." Gerard stuffed it into his pocket like a precious jewel.

"But anyway," Frank pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket with a brand new lighter. He lit up on the first flick and smoked without missing a beat. He handed it to Gerard and he could fucking taste him on the paper. "At least the sunset looks nice." He sighed and leaned to his side so that he could blow the smoke directly into Gerard's face. 

"Yeah, it does." Gerard didn't swat it away. He couldn't see the colors of the sky because his eyes burned, but they were slowly getting better with the rapidly fleeting light. 

It was when he saw Frank start rummaging around for his phone in between drags that he felt a wave of panic course through him. 

"Cheese." Frank pointed the camera at the apparent deep magenta of the horizon above the water and showed it to him after he took it.

"Please don't take any of me." Gerard spat out, terrified that he would turn it towards him and see that he didn't show up on the screen. 

"It's okay, I won't. I just want to remember  _ this."  _ He took another photo of the sky and admired it in his gallery. "Don't worry, you look incredible, anyway."

Gerard was sure that this was the last fucking straw. He had no idea how he kept his shit together, but the night moved on. He took another puff of Frank's cigarette and the flavor of the smoke was exactly like him, permeating all the way down to the bottom of his lungs so that tiny atoms, pieces of him, were deep inside him enough that he felt ownership over them. From the wine to the smoke, to the colors he was finally starting to be able to see, everything was going to remind him of him. From his imagination to his dick, he really liked him. 

Gerard could hear the ducks in the reeds starting to stir and find them, following the sounds of their voices and the scent of their wine and smoke as a sign of food. It wasn't like there was a lack of that here, the pond was surely teeming with life, but there must have been enough people here at this park at one point to make the human approach for food hereditary through every generation of waterfowl. Frank dug around his backpack again and pulled out a sweating bag of once frozen peas that had thawed out more than he'd probably intended, soaking the outside of the zipper bag he kept the opened package in and filling a little portion of it with water.

"They always seem to remember me, without fail. These are their favorites." He tossed a handful a few feet in front of them and waited a couple seconds for the birds to land there.

The ducks came up to the edge of their towel, nipping at the grass to find the sweet, round treats nestled there. They chirped at them, some waddling right up to Frank and pecking peas from his hand.

"Here." He said, pouring some out of the package into Gerard's hand. "They won't hurt you, I promise."

Gerard held an unsteady palm out to his left side and a brown feathered bird sat herself down right beside it and gently ate the peas one by one. He had always been enthralled by animals, last night was no exception, but this was a particular sense of peace that he was going to remember for a very long time. "Look." He whispered, tapping Frank's arm with his other hand. "She's so cute."

Frank moved to sit right next to Gerard with his hands on his shoulders. He could feel his breath against his neck. "See how she's sitting? That's her mate right there." He pointed to a shiny looking mallard that was right behind her, picking up the peas that she dropped. "She's stressed because she's about to lay her eggs. You're helping her out more than she'll be able to thank you for." He stayed with him even after he stopped talking, refilling his hand with food and tossing more out in front of him. The ducks followed his every move, almost distinctly lining up to get their turns at Gerard's palm. "There you go."

Gerard could feel his hair brushing against his cheek, his hands on his shoulders that occasionally shifted to his upper back weren't helping at all. His hand started to shake slightly even though he was trying as hard as he could to stay still so that he wouldn't scare the animals off.

"It's okay." Frank caught on and comforted him, even though his smooth voice in his ear only made it harder to keep himself afloat. "I've been feeding them for years, they know not to bite you."

_ I'm not worried about the birds,  _ Gerard thought,  _ you're making me sweat.  _ And he was overwhelmed by how simply Frank turned spring to summer, sweltering heat and humidity in the pockets between the skin and bone in his fingers that he used to make Gerard forget everything. It took all of his strength to keep his obsessive love inside because Frank had a way of making him want to confess all he'd ever kept secret. He succeeded though, but he had no idea how.

Frank slid his hand along Gerard's back to sit underneath his own hand, opening his fingers with his thumb that somehow bent backwards and lacing their fingers together. Gerard's breathing hitched. 

"Shh.." Frank set his chin on Gerard's shoulder. His nose bumped his cheek. "Breathe." 

He took in as much air as he could, filling his lungs from top to bottom before letting it out slowly. 

"Good." He lulled. "You got it." 

And he did. Gerard kept breathing through it and he was fine. Fine with the touch, fine with how close he was, fine with  _ him.  _ He didn't feel the magnetic pull to turn over and stick his tongue in his mouth, he just felt at ease with him, something he had yet to experience so far. For the first time he'd been able to calm himself down, this was pretty sacred. 

It's that feeling you get when you just melt into it, when you're just so dissolved into the solvent that you wouldn't dare let your guts twist to fuel the flame of your fear so that you boil over. It's that feeling you get when it just feels natural, like huddling around a fire in the cold to keep your blood hot, when you finally feel the love and the intimacy that you've been yearning for. Being this intertwined with Frank felt like it was meant to happen, that final resting place of all of his nervousness, but he couldn't help but wrestle with the angels and demons on his shoulders that couldn't make up their minds on what his motive for this was. Was it just a friendly gesture that humans did to each other all the time? Or was it something more? He'd never know and Frank would never tell, so he was left to wonder while his heart fell into a stable ditch to rest. Even still, he wished that he'd stop on the side of the road and find it laying there so that he could nurture it back to its former health.

"You can put your hand down now." Frank spoke quietly and the ducks slowly dispersed, nipping at the grass around them in search of more. "That was fun, wasn't it?" 

Gerard smiled. "I loved it." 

"Good." The end of Frank's tone sounded like he wanted to say so much more, but he ended it there. 

He left Gerard's shoulder to drink and find a trash can for the plastic bags, carrying the bottle with him and taking small sips of it. 

Gerard watched him walk. His legs looked so soft and smooth in the setting sun, slightly tan for how pale his skin actually was. He didn't have any other tattoos on his legs besides the little cross, most of the ink occupied his right arm and neck. It was then that the rogue thought crested and crashed like a wave into his head: maybe there wasn't some sweet sugar plum intention behind this night, maybe Frank just did this because he genuinely wanted to be around him, but that didn't especially settle his stomach either. It wasn't like he'd be completely heartbroken if they were just friends for a while, but no one really looks forward to finding out their crush doesn't like them. Everyone wants to be loved and almost everyone wants that electric fire kiss. Gerard was most definitely not exempt from that statistic.

"Do you wanna look at the stars?" Frank chimed, already laying down on his back with his left arm stretched out.

"I'd love to, yeah." Gerard sat awkwardly in the crook of Frank's shoulder and strained his neck to look up at the fuzzy sky.

"You can lay with me if that makes it easier to see." His chest never looked more inviting.

"Right, yeah- uh, sorry." He didn't even try to force out a laugh, he was getting flustered already.

"You have nothing to be sorry for." Frank let Gerard find his own comfortable spot on the towel, inching closer and closer until he laid stiffly with his arms crossed over his ribs. "Come here. It gets cold sometimes."

That was a lie, this was the first time that it had been tolerable outside for a while, the past few weeks had been a blessing for haters of the cold, and Gerard hadn't picked his jacket up off the floor in that long, so he doubted that he would so much as chatter his teeth if the breeze came and froze him again. Nevertheless, he let Frank nudge him in closer to him so that he was touching him on one side from his shoulders to his feet. No wonder he gave him the tip, he was like a human hearth, both literally and figuratively, because he made Gerard's constantly frigid hands thaw out, and because he was starting to become the center of his universe. 

"What do you think?" Frank had a knack for asking Gerard how he was pretty frequently, whether it be a fear of making him uncomfortable or afraid or whatever it may be that humans are so afraid of, but it made him feel secure with him. Being nurtured and checked on is the closest you can get to the purest form of intimacy without touch.

"I can count the number of stars I can see on one hand."

Frank laughed. "It is kinda pathetic, sorry, I tried."

"You uh- you have nothing to be sorry for." Gerard echoed, letting himself relax into Frank's arm under the back of his neck.

"That's absolutely right."

It was quiet again, save for the lapping of the pond and the bird songs, the creaking and swishing of the trees and their leaves. Gerard counted the stars in groups of threes so he could keep himself grounded. How funny was it that something so stereotypical brought him so much peace? "What do you think is out there, Frank?" As nice as the silence was, and as lovely as Frank's heartbeat sounded against the rhythmic waves on the water, he missed his voice already.

"Good question." Frank pointed up at the beige clouds that were rolling in over them. "I'd like to think that there's someone or something up there that can give us some sort of comfort, you know? But if there isn't, I don't know, I don't think I'd be that torn up about it."

Gerard expected something like  _ I don't fucking know, aliens and shit,  _ but that would work too. "I think there's parallel universes that have planets with helium for air so that all the E.T.s that live there talk in really high pitched voices, but God's cool… I guess."

"I like you." Frank smiled. "Fucking dork."

"You're the one getting all philosophical at nine o'clock at night." He teased, loosening his arms from his diaphragm. "I tolerate you at best."

"Glad to hear it." Frank turned from the night sky to look him in the eye. 

"You know," Gerard started. "Maybe it's okay that we don't know what's actually out there."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, what if they've got x-ray beams for eyelashes and we ever get a hold of them, they'd just kill us on contact and take over the world."

"Would that be so terrible, though?" Frank rolled his eyes. "It'd be badass as fuck."

"It would be, but we'd also be dead and there wouldn't be any ducks to feed so…"

"Yeah… I guess you're right about that. It would suck if you weren't here on this planet with me."

Gerard stared at a single star in the sky with all of his might so that he could try and get it to explode like his heart just did. "I appreciate it."

"Besides, it makes wondering about things ten times funner."

"Frank, I don't think funner is a word."

"Goddamnit, let me have something tonight." He looked away from him but Gerard felt warm anyway. "You were  _ that  _ kid in school, weren't you?"

"I went to art school, so, no."

"Dude, no way!" Frank turned onto his side to face him completely. "I was so close to going to art school too, but… oh well."

"What happened?" 

"I don't really know, I had good grades, I could afford it, I had a good job… I guess it just fell through at the last minute."

"I know how that feels." Gerard swallowed a knot in his throat. "Was it your parents or something?"

"No, I just felt like I was overreaching myself, you know? I can't really explain it. What started as a gap semester turned into a couple gap  _ years."  _

Gerard smiled a little. "Really?"

"Yeah. I guess it just hasn't been the right time for a while now. Did you graduate?"

"I dropped out when uh…" He rubbed the left side of his neck, entirely out of muscle memory. "Something happened with Mikey and I had to be there for him, it's a long story."

"I bet." Frank nestled him in close again. "Maybe the time will come again."

"Hmm. Maybe." Gerard could have fallen asleep there with Frank's arm under his head, but his heart was beating fast enough that it replaced his hemoglobin with adrenaline, so he had to inject oxygen straight into the vein itself to keep it pumping through his body.

The sky was pale. Its arms were curled and wisped from the tops of the clouds to the low bottoms that were flicked on in the industrially revolutionized soil below, almost radioactive with how heated they looked. It surely was a means for concern about the state of the climate there, Gerard had made sure to use less plastic in the household after the first crazy winter they had and how immoderately the spring always unfolded after the fact. Such a small town in the middle of basically nowhere had such a booming footprint for its size, too many unnecessary businesses were only there for the pure gold they could churn out of the bigger cities' wallets, because as long as you only watch where each coin lands in the bank, you never have to look at how black you've made the sky, tainted and bloated like coal in a child's snotty hand on Christmas morning.

The guys were lucky enough that it hadn't impeded on their health at all, that with Ray's incessant worries manifesting in the back of his hand on foreheads and the dying of the grass all over town, it was a miracle that any of the townspeople were still standing. Of course, it was expected that they'd remain in good viability, sometimes even they forgot they were immortal, but time only tells the ability of the humanoid mind. It works in more mysterious ways than can be conjured up, not even the brightest of humans can figure themselves out, so why would they spend any more copious amounts of time that they're already running out of to study and embrace regenerating brain tissue that they will never reach the center of?

Gerard just thought it was lucky that he'd be able to stick around for the inevitable demise of humanity's own creation, rotting away and cooking its inhabitants alive like little sesame seeds on a bun. He decided that he'd be the lone grain that refused to bake, crunchy and wedged between teeth so far that whoever's eating it has to bolt to the dentist for a stake and a scalpel down the throat.

"I hope you're not bored by me."

"By _ you? _ I never could be." Gerard let his thoughts topple to the side to make room for another one of Frank's pictures. "Is it just because I'm quiet?"

Frank didn't reply, so Gerard assumed the answer was yes, ironically so.

"Because I'm thinking a lot, I promise I'm more amused than anything else."

"Okay, good." He squirmed a little in his place, lying still on his back on the maroon colored towel, arm outstretched and bearing the weight of all Gerard's thoughts. "What are you thinking about?"

"Oh, you know, the weather and how weird it is. It's nothing really out of the ordinary, it always rains and zig-zags like it has been through temperament, but it's beautiful to look at, isn't it?"

Frank had a twinkle in his eye, probably a passing plane and nothing more, but that didn't mean that Gerard would forget it. "It really is. You like the clouds, don't you?"

"They're like a blanket, yeah."

"That's the best description I've heard anyone give. It's safely brooding in a way, right? Like we're either shielded from Heaven or it's come down to meet us."

"I like that too." Gerard tried not to dissolve himself into more thought, wanting to keep Frank engaged by spitting out the ones that would set on fire the easiest and those alone, but with as much information as he was having to relay, it took him a bit to find his wits in the reverb.

_ Frank  _ was beautiful to look at. He liked the clouds because they felt like him, soft, sculpted, sharp when they needed to be, and nourishing when they brought the rejuvenation of the first rain. Was that really another thing that Gerard was going to add to his list of  _ Frank's Things,  _ or was he just desperately reaching for something physical to touch and love unconditionally when Frank wouldn't?

"You're good at talking." Gerard's voice felt smooth and cool in his mouth.

"You're good at listening."

As the night progressed, and the stars had flown their way over like jets at a sports game, they found it less and less of a need to fill the space with sound. Their breathing did just the trick and time was higher quality than the clearest glass you've ever looked through: a crystal lens on the eye of eternity.

And- really- what was eternity? What did they mean by  _ forever  _ when it was coined in the books? At what point does infinity reach maturity? At what point do her bones begin to thin out? No matter how he put it, he just couldn't fathom how long forever was. Who really  _ could?  _ The idea that eternity has a crest implies that it has an end, which defeats the purpose of the word, but what counts as a sizable amount of time when you've just broken your yardstick and have no method with which to measure it? What task takes ages in comparison and which is too small of a second to ever record on the timeline? The true concept of immortality was so overwhelmingly massive that it gave him headaches every time he thought about it. Sure, he was settled in just fine with being content about never dying, pushing that fear out of heads does a dandy trick, but there was no way he was ever going to wrap his head around how long it would take. Humans usually live for 80 years, growing up you think that's such an unfathomable length, but as slow as the world spins to those who have no concept of its speed is enough to invert your insides. Gerard was only 25, and he was going to  _ stay  _ 25 forever, but he'd already been so bored with age that he had just realized a week prior to this outing that he had forgotten his own birthday over a month ago. It was the last real birthday he was ever going to have and he couldn't even be bothered to show up for himself. He imagined infinity: her figure-eight eyes, the seamless rounds of the irises she uses to gaze upon the rupture of time, all knowing and all encompassing the never-ending knowledge that these three drunken men from New Jersey would have an eternal fit about who possessed more of it. The tip of the iceberg was slick and they capsized the ship, but each and every time, the glacier would bob back up again in the seawater and the cycle would repeat. Gerard loved to think that infinity got a kick of this. He loved to think that she had a plan or something in mind to make the misery stop. He loved to think that, despite the literal meaning of it, forever would cease to continue and they could live in the stillness for a second before finally getting to rest. Maybe they'd return to orbit again, maybe they never would, but never was becoming a word that nobody liked anymore. What's with all this certainty? Wasn't this the shade under the swan's wing where no one knows anything for fact? Why was this all of a sudden the purple curtain in front of the fortune teller's booth at the county fair? Step right up, three tokens please- oh, and your soul, while you're here, why not?

Gerard was just thinking about how long they'd been there, he'd lost track of time, as one does when they're through with hearing the ticking of the pendulum, so he was slightly unsettled at Frank's own sudden remarks to go home, like he'd read his mind. 

"It's late." He pulled his phone out of his pocket and turned the screen on for a second to glance at the time before shoving it back in. "I hate to cut you short, but-"

"It's okay, really, tonight was lovely. I needed it."

"Well, I'm proud that I got to give you a little escape. If you need another one, you have my number and you know where to find me, okay?"

"Of course."

"I'll take you back home and get out of your hair."

_ I wish you'd get in it…  _

The whole way back to Gerard's house seemed to take forever, maybe it was the crushing weight of the silence because of how Gerard really didn't want to see him go, or maybe Frank was driving ten times slower than he had when he drove him to the park initially because he felt the same way. Whatever it was, it was making them both crazy but neither of them were going to admit it, so the fog dragged on till that last turn past the Carter road sign and Gerard felt the pressure lift off of his stomach. He didn't have to pretend to want to make small talk anymore, he could walk into his front door, shut it, and admit that he liked him more than anything and Frank wouldn't hear a thing. At least he was ready to be honest about how indecisive he was about whether he should get into his pants or under the skin of his neck first. Once the car stopped, the veil began to thin. Gerard hoped to God it would tear so that he could see the pretty face underneath. He was fairly sure that the face would just be Frank's and that it would haunt him at the wake for the rest of his life, drearily and sadly until he figured out how long that would actually be. As beautiful as he was, it'd be miserable having to always see him in the dark, far away, unable to reach out and touch him because, the second he did, he'd disappear into the mist only to return in the dead of night at the foot of his bed, head cocked to the side, eyes wide, and mouth agape. But most importantly, he'd be completely dead. That was the thing that really stopped Gerard from thinking about turning; he'd have him next to him every second of every hour until one or both of them got staked through the heart, but he'd also be the shell of who he once was and he'd never be able to get that piece back. There was never again. He'd never leave but he'd never heal and he'd never be the same and he'd never really love me anyway… 

"Here's your stop." Frank's voice was low, trying not to awaken the supposed sleeping housemates that, if they were literally anyone else, wouldn't enjoy being roused at this hour.

"Thanks, Frank."

"Hey, anytime, okay?"

"Anytime."

He shut the car door and his muted face faded away until it looked like a smudge in the dark. His fangs dropped immediately and he shut his lips tight and turned his back, running his tongue over the points while he thought of something he could chew on to fight back against the urge. He resolved to just suck on the collar of his shirt like Mikey used to when he was a kid.

"Hi." Gerard sighed, sinking into the couch just inside the doorway. "I'm home."

"What happened?" Ray called from across the house, obviously Mikey's room because, why the hell would he be anywhere else?

"Come in here and I'll tell you."

"Mikey's laying on me, I can't move."

"You think I wanna see that? He's my brother, not a suckling kitten, he'll live."

There were a couple groans from down the hallway, probably from Mikey as he complained about being left alone, but Ray appeared in a minute anyway, hair slightly tangled and sleep circles dark around his eyes. 

"Okay, I'm here."

"Is that Mikey's jacket?"

Ray looked down at his torso and smoothed it out. "Yeah…"

"It's so small on you, oh my God."

The sleeves came just up to the middle of his forearms and the jacket itself barely reached his waist. He straightened his posture a little bit. "Did you call me in here to make fun of me, or did you have a story to tell?"

"Both." Gerard chuckled. "He's incredible."

"Oh, I know-"

"Not my brother, you asshole.  _ Frank." _

"What about him?" Ray hid a splotch of red crawling up his cheek.

"We drank and fed the ducks- they ate right out of our hands, Ray- then we watched the sunset, and he let me lay on his arm while we looked at the stars, and then we just talked. I forgot how touchy mortals are." Gerard was glowing.

"Did he touch you?"

"Ray, he was  _ all over me. _ He thought that wrapping his arm around me to hold my hand and put his chin on my shoulder would stop me from shaking, but- news flash- it didn't. If I wasn't near him in some way, he wouldn't have it."

"Well, I'm glad you had a nice time, Gee."

"He gave me his number." Gerard dug the little piece of paper out of his pocket and properly looked at it. It had little blue stars scrawled all over the empty space and  _ 'Frank Iero - Cell'  _ written in scratchy handwriting. "Hm." Gerard hummed at it.

"What?"

"His last name is fucking  _ Iero."  _ He showed him the slip of paper but didn't let go of it. 

Ray chuckled, but mostly at Gerard.

"Why are you laughing at  _ me?"  _ Gerard looked at it again, following how the shitty blue pen flowed over the paper. He tried to picture him writing it.

"Because you're blushing over his fucking name. How easy is it to get you to fawn?"

"Too easy." Gerard neatly folded it this time and held it between his palms.

He could hear Mikey's voice ring through the corridor, and before he could look up and make fun of Ray for how quickly his ears perked up, he was already gone. And so he was alone again. He programmed the number into his contacts and made sure to include his last name in the profile. Straight away, he texted him.

_ "nice last name nerd" _

Grinning ear-to-ear now, he retired himself and the dizzying screen to his room where he only continued to be alone, and even more so as he listened to the faint, muffled affections coming from the other side of the wall. The joy in their voices didn't kill his mood for once, but lifted it, making him feel like there might be something to the whole  _ love  _ thing. He didn't know if he'd have the guts to do it and make it permanent, but at least he knew that he wanted it now and he was going to keep doing whatever the hell he was doing because it was starting to work. Gerard really didn't know what the hell he was doing. All he knew was that it was doing exactly what he remembered it had. He could feel him inching closer and closer until he was totally into him, embedding himself in the coarse fibers of the muscles deep within his chest. Gerard couldn't wait for Frank to finally reach his ventricles, loop his fingers around his tangled tubes, and knit himself a nice little bloody sweater to wear when he missed him. He couldn't stop hoping that he missed him. Given from how he acted around him the past two days and how he ached to be touching him, he thought it would be safe to assume that he likely did.

Almost instantly, he replied.  _ "thanks dork. i have my father's eyes too" _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	14. xiv

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> eee! happy vamp day! this is a big one for me bc i've gotten so many lovely comments and messages from people that have meant so much. i'm so glad that this can mean something to people. and most of all, we hit 1.1k!! i never would have imagined that my work would get that much attention, and i'm so so thankful for everyone that has been a part of this journey. thank you endlessly for the support.
> 
> here is the long awaited chapter 14! this one also had to be rewritten once or twice (that was a long time ago, i don't remember, lol) so the finished product is a labor of love. i hope you like it!!
> 
> if you need me, i'll be rocking out to the new electric century single.
> 
> socialz!!!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

"Gerard, it's been three days, you can get out of bed now." Mikey set a piping hot cup of coffee on the nightstand as he always did. "It's 10:31 on Thursday, May twenty-first, and I miss you a lot."

"Mmph." Gerard rubbed his face with his hands, blinking awake at the stillness of the house. "I miss you too, Mikey." He opened his arms for him, laying on his back, and Mikey set his head on his chest.

Gerard smelled exactly the same every day, dark and like metal, which was the blood talking, but fresh and soft like the sheets he never had the energy to change as often as he really should. Slightly sweaty, but mostly masked and drenched in the earthy, metallic, wine-like smell that the house simmered in. It was like the foundation and the bedrock beneath it was a bubbling pot. He didn't necessarily smell bad, but it was one of those scents that you just can't figure out but you keep smelling it because you can't understand why it's so pleasant yet so confusing at the same time.

His chest felt empty, hollow, cold, his ribs shivered in the evening chill. The house was warm in the spring but the atmosphere was heavy and thick. Why was it so bleak without him? Why did the air have a particular sting to it for the past three days? Why didn't he see a point in getting up and living his eternal life if Frank wasn't there to live it too?

"You miss him, don't you, Gee?" Mikey asked, muffled in the wrinkles of Gerard's shirt.

He didn't answer, but he figured Mikey could tell just by being near him.

They'd been texting pretty much non-stop since they saw each other, trying to figure out what they could do if they met up again, and Gerard had been stalling by pretending he was busy, but he was actually wondering if he even knew himself, much less the things that reminded him of Frank that he could pass off as friendly activities. It was getting harder and harder to pretend that he didn't have feelings for him, and it's not like he ever tried to hide it, but being as close as he was getting to him was making him choke up.

"I know how you feel, okay?"

Gerard craned his neck down at him. "Mikey, you wilt when you blink because you can't see Ray."

Mikey sat up. "That was uncalled for."

"You set yourself up for that one." He chuckled and poked at Mikey's hand.

Almost instinctively, Mikey turned over his shoulder at the doorway to see if Ray was there. 

There was a longer pause and Gerard could hear the moon groan as it crawled onward. The night seemed to rush away. He prayed that the next one would come and it did.

-

"I think you should go for it." Ray had come to see him in bed this time, the most progress that he'd made was sitting up and sipping mugs of coffee, Ray had fitted him in a new shirt, since the old one was stinking up the entire room by that point. "I think that, if you really like him, you should at least try and make it obvious."

"I barely know him, Toro."

"But you can get to know him the more you hang out with him. You don't have to know everything about someone to date them."

"I know, but…" He sighed. "I just don't want to jump in too fast. I'm head-over-heels for him but I just don't know where to start. I don't want to scare him off by making a move, but I also don't want to sit around and wait for him to do something that he probably won't."

"You can't be for sure when it comes to humans. They  _ are  _ fucking weird, though, and I don't blame you for not being able to read him." Ray put a reassuring hand on Gerard's knee.

"I guess you're right." Gerard wondered how he had been lying in bed for four straight nights and he hadn't gotten tired of it yet.

"Subtly test the water, dip your toes in, see what happens." Ray shrugged. "Knowing him, the worst that could happen is that he doesn't notice, he's already so touchy with you, so I think, worst case scenario, he just thinks you're being nice."

"How many times have we had to go over this, Ray?" Gerard sat up in place, watching how his toes pointed up at the ceiling under the thin sheet that was already too hot for him, but it felt like Frank's gentle touches, so he kept it on anyway.

"It feels like a million times, but I keep saying it because I don't want you to give up on another thing. Ever since I started living with you, all you've ever seemed to be able to do is throw yourself into mundane things that don't make you happy: feeds, card games, alcohol… I have never seen you as happy as you are when you talk about him."

"Oh God." Gerard let gravity pull him backwards onto his pillow again. "Is it that obvious?"

"I think it's good that it is." Ray said, offering his hand out to him so that he could sit back up. "Mortals miss each other. I know you miss that, and I can see you missing him right now. You fucking glow with it." Ray's tone perked up at the end when Gerard took his hand and ruffled his hair as he stretched.

"I  _ do  _ miss him."

"Then  _ tell  _ him that. If you really want him to make a move so that you don't feel pushy, you have to make sure he knows that you'd be comfortable with it. You already know that he is, he's all over you, I can see his fingerprints muddled with yours, but we can't be for sure if he knows that  _ you  _ are."

"So…" Gerard turned over to his phone, sitting on the nightstand, screen dusty and cold to the touch.

"So… just send him a text and tell him you miss him. Or call him if you're feeling ballsy. Do what you gotta do, just make it clear that you feel at least  _ something  _ worth noting."

"We've been texting all day every day since we saw each other, I think he gets the memo." He hesitated.

"Tell him before  _ I  _ do it myself." Ray teased, crossing his arms and looking like he would type out the most embarrassingly sinister message that was just dirty enough that Frank would never talk to him again. He didn't seem like the type of guy to do that at all, but Gerard didn't necessarily want to take his chances and find out if he actually was.

He plucked the charger out and turned the screen on. It was way too bright but that was as low as it would go, so he squinted and opened the chat, grinning slightly at a few of their most recent messages:  _ 'no because a zombie apocalypse would actually suck ass. we'd both be super-dead.' _

_ 'i'm glad you're not super-dead.'  _

_ 'that's actually my superhero name.'  _

_ 'thank you super-dead you saved my family!'  _

_ 'i'd let you save my family any day of the week.'  _

_ 'ditto.'  _

"You're so cheesy it hurts." Ray rolled his eyes at the blush crawling up Gerard's cheeks.

"Shut up." Gerard typed out a simple  _ 'i really miss you.',  _ deleted the  _ really,  _ added it back in, bit his tongue, and then removed it again before sending it. "Wait-" He clenched his fist. "It's like… one in the morning, I can't-" A message popped up.

_ 'i guarantee you i miss you more.' _

Without skipping a beat:  _ 'i don't think that's possible.' _

_ 'willing to bet on that?' _

_ 'i dare you.' _

"Wait-" Again. "He stopped replying. If he actually…"

"You walked right into that trap, buddy. Good luck, comrade." Ray stood up and pretended to salute him.

"Don't leave me." Gerard dramatically exaggerated reaching out into the room to catch him again, not wanting to be left alone with whatever chaos he just incited against his household this time.

"You're on your own now, partner." Ray disappeared around the corner, finding his way to Mikey's room to hover over whatever artistic project he decided to take up to distract himself this time.

Gerard tried his best to ignore the hypotheticals, he doubted that that one minute long text thread would be enough to summon him to his front lawn, but he only lived a mile away, so he hated that it kind of made sense for him to randomly show up like he did a few days ago. He wanted to swallow his tongue. He only laid there, dreading all of his life's choices for a few seconds before he scrambled into presentable clothes and chased Ray down again so that he could fix his hair.

"He's gonna fucking show up."

"Who is?" Mikey scratched an itch on his nose, smearing a dusty stripe of pastel pink across his skin. Ray wiped it off with his thumb, cupping the side of his face. 

Gerard hated how grossly in love they were all the time. Give me a break… he thought. He was supposed to be happy for them, damn it.

_ "Frank  _ is."

"Now?" Mikey wasn't paying attention to anything anymore.

"I don't know! Pretend to be asleep or some-" There was a knock at the door.  _ "Son of a bitch."  _ Right as Ray had gotten his hair just right, Gerard ran his hands through it, making it stick up all over the place. He took one last look at the two of them, who were practically sitting on each other's laps, if that was even possible, and Ray had his hand over Mikey's mouth. "Both of you shut up."

By the time Gerard got his hand on the knob, he was already shaking. He'd wasted the time he could've used to hesitate. Opening the door, he was met by him again.

"I don't chicken out of dares." Frank looked so damn smug, raising one of his eyebrows as he leaned against the door frame with one ankle crossed over the other. "My turn." He pulled him outside by the wrist.

The porch was just perfect that night, and Gerard regretted staying in and missing as much of the weather as he had. There was just enough of a breeze to keep the light air moving, and the night kept the reaches of the sun fluid and tame. The stars were a tad bit brighter, or maybe he was just imagining them.

"Truth or dare, Gerard?" Frank asked in that beautiful voice of his, playful tone still jokingly mischievous in his throat.

"Uh… truth." He didn't even ask why he was nervous because he knew the exact answer, down to the spelling.

"Wise choice." He guided them down to sit on the wood right outside the door, and Gerard fidgeted with the wiry coir of the doormat. "How badly did you want to see me, on a scale of one to ten? One being 'you're just an acquaintance to fill my time,' and ten being 'I wanna fuck you till you forget your name.'"

Gerard stared at his crossed legs, wide-eyed, trying to figure out an acceptable answer. In reality, he knew for a fact that his answer would be a solid eleven, but to the guy he'd only seen face-to-face four times, he had to train the beast to be docile. "I uh…"

Frank was surprisingly patient. Maybe it was because he knew he could get a worthwhile reply out of him if he didn't force it, or maybe he was kind enough to accept something subpar if it meant that Gerard was comfortable. Or maybe he was just as desperately horny as Gerard was and this was how people on a limited clock flirt. Why was it that he just now realized he'd been so sickeningly romantic the entire time? He'd spent so long wishing that he could get a piece of him that he failed to pay attention to the entire pie being handed to him on a golden platter. Heaven pie, was it?

He couldn't think of anything that would accurately capture every number greater than ten in his mind and match the reasonable first base that he wanted to start with. Gerard was in too deep anyway. Like Ray had said, he had walked right into Frank's trap and there was no getting out of this one.

Red shot into his face. "Ten." He gulped and instantly regretted ever opening his mouth this evening. He should've shut up the second he saw Ray slide around the corner into his bedroom. It shouldn't have gone any farther than that, but there he was. He wished that things felt less real.

Frank looked a bit taken aback as well, sucking his cheeks in and biting them. "Well then." He said, still not breaking his gaze on him. 

"I'm sorry." Gerard spat, still not looking up at just how gorgeous he knew he looked.

"Don't be." He scooted a little closer to him on the wood, at which Gerard flinched, now having to fix his brain and face him. "Your turn."

"Truth or um… or dare, Frank?"

He  _ was  _ beautiful. He was right. It was comical how incredible a plain, tight, black v-neck shirt could look on someone, simple and to the point. Gerard could taste licorice in the back of his mouth.

"Dare." He replied, reclining back on his hands so he could both get a proper full view of Gerard's posture and show off the delicate, thin skin of his neck for the whole world to see.

"You said you'd bet on whether you missed me more. How would we do that?"

"Like this." Frank had a way of guiding him to exactly where he needed to be, unfolding Gerard's rainbow spine so that he could stretch his legs out in front of him. "Can I sit on your lap?"

"Yeah." Gerard's breath hitched, but in a good way, he found his oxygen and a tiny sliver of the missing piece in the space between Frank's pelvis and his own as he moved to straddle his lap. He was expectedly light, his soft thighs were just right to hold. Thank God his back was against the wall of the house, or else he'd be completely slumped over and begging him to cover his neck in bruises. "You win." He mumbled, careful not to dismiss the gentle clouds forming around them in their own little world. Gerard wished that he could pray that he couldn't feel him underneath him, but he knew from experience that he could, so equal amounts of blood filled his face, turning his ears tomato red.

"Is this okay?" He asked, lightening his weight on him. "If you're uncomfortable I can-"

"It's fine." Gerard could feel everything gently floating away. His nerves were finally settling. He was never quite sure why he was so nervous around Frank in the beginning, it always wore off until he was so comfortable with him that he felt almost criminal letting him go. "You look nice tonight." He bit his tongue, hoping that it was enough to satisfy the mood.

"Thank you." He smiled. "You look  _ amazing."  _

Gerard rolled his eyes. He was always one-upping him.

"My turn. Truth or dare?" Frank shifted a little, giving Gerard a life-saving dose of friction.

"Truth." He looked him in the eyes, finally, and felt like the whole world stopped spinning for a moment.

"You bet."

The licorice taste turned to molasses.

Another twitch. "Can I lay my head on your chest?"

Gerard was so painfully hot that he could've slid his hands from the hems of Frank's jeans to the button of his waistband and gotten him off right there, but he slowed himself down.

"You don't have to if you don't…" Frank trailed off as Gerard opened his arms and softly pulled him in by the back of the neck.

Frank's body was delicate, just how Gerard had imagined it to be under his hands, his heart beating against his own and the soft warmth of his face on his chest filled the clouds around them with lavender. Now, he was pretty sure. He was pretty sure that he was gonna fall fast and hard and he wasn't ever gonna be able to pick himself up off the ground. Maybe that would be okay. Maybe he'd like the soil if Frank was laying there next to him. Frank was perfect; he was sure of that, too. He was sure that nothing could ever change how much he pulled to him, how deeply he liked him, and how insane he made him with want, with lust, with cherry red. He was more luscious and rich than any pastry a chef could ever dream of. Frank  _ was  _ cherry red, in all senses of the color, olive green leaves adorning his fruity center like ornaments and trophies in a great hall.

The world still hadn't started spinning yet, he dissolved in the heat as Frank continued to buzz on top of him, rocking back and forth as slowly as he possibly could so he could keep the charge electric. Gerard was stupid with it, huffing in heavy fumes from Frank's breath that made his eyes long for the back of his brain.

Gerard could picture those big puppy eyes of his staring at him, glimmering in the brightness of the after-midnight spotlight. He could feel him all over him, everywhere, coating all the unvarnished space with gloss. There was no doubt that he wanted this to continue forever, if this moment of sweaty tension were to last for the rest of his infinite life, he would be so content, but the urge to roll him over and, namely, fuck him until he forgot his name, was overwhelming. Gerard was a man of control, he knew this, always astounding himself with his abilities to hold his tongue and his dick in place so he wouldn't cause a total riot, but with him as close as he was, and with as much slack as he'd let out recently, he was unsure if he could live up to that title anymore.

Gerard wasn't gonna lie, there was a pang under his tongue that stabbed the bone there telling him that it was moving too fast, fast enough to blur vision and upset stomachs, but the rest of him was thrilled with this sweet little arm of reality that had popped out of socket. Gerard had no concept of time usually, but that night, none of it counted towards the total list of  _ Things He'd Done While Living Forever.  _ A cheat day, if you will. Because maybe it was going a little too quickly for his timid mind to process correctly, but Gerard loved the racy hormones dancing inside of him and the velocity of the stripes as they circled his track. After all those years cooped up in a house with two other guys who were cooped up even more, it was time to live a little. He missed living.

"Truth or dare, Frank?"

He sat up and smiled at him, inches from his face. Gerard could hear his little exhale out of his nose, satisfied and dizzyingly flirty. Frank was a goddamn blizzard if blizzards could make you sweat. "Truth."

"How badly did you want to see  _ me  _ on a scale of one to ten? One being 'I only did this because it'd be rude not to,' and ten being-"

"Thirteen." Frank shut him up, moving a hand from on top of Gerard's that still hadn't left his thigh to brush his face. He wasn't sure if he was fixing his obviously purposefully messed hair or if he was just touching purely to touch him, even though there really wasn't any way he could touch him even more than he already was.

"I didn't even finish."

"You don't have to." Frank's voice seemed to grow increasingly more breathy, mocking the way he moaned that one night that Gerard very much remembered, and looking like he was making out with him in his mind.

He was so close to him, he was so accessible, open like a gate, he could just waltz right in and get comfortable, but with everyone he knew on the other side of the door, he wasn't too keen on making a scene. The tension was now a solid glacier of ice that would take centuries to saw through, generation upon generation would try their hand at the blade but no one would ever succeed. For as long as Gerard lived without a stake in his chest, he would still be headstrong in slicing through it like the softened butter he wished it was. He wished that Frank would live forever so that he could help him… 

It was obvious that this was Frank's signal to bring him inside and to bed with him, he was moving around a lot more, whining in his ear from his spot on his chest, but he knew that, if he did, and obeyed the begging of every cell in his body, there was no way they'd get past the front door.

"Frank, I…"

"What's the matter?" He relaxed a little, keeping his eyes open for a change.

"I… I uh- I can't. Not right now." Gerard pushed the words out and each one offended the swollen bits of tissue behind his top row of teeth. "Everyone's home. I'd love to but-" He glanced over his shoulder at the doorknob that was so easily in reach.

"Oh… I'm sorry, I forget that sometimes." Frank swung his leg over and sat next to Gerard. 

His lap met the air and it stung, bones empty without his pressure on them. He figured that pulling one of his knees up would cover up the obvious tension in his hips. "It's okay."

"We'll figure it out sometime, okay?" Frank chimed, already moving to stand up.

"Hey, wait." Gerard met him on his feet, rogue hand grasping at his shoulder. "Don't feel bad. You didn't do anything wrong, you don't have to say you're sorry."

Frank's lip quivered a little, but he bit it to stop it. "I guess so, I just shouldn't have been so pushy, but-"

_ "But…  _ I liked it, you know. You can be pushy." Gerard could hear Frank's heartbeat quicken. "We'll talk about it, okay? How about tomorrow? We could do it at your place so it's not as uh… awkward." He looked over at the door again.

Frank nodded and smirked just enough so that Gerard could see it. "Tomorrow at nine. Bring your one to ten scale." He picked Gerard's hand up off of his shoulder and kissed his palm. "I'll see you then. Be there." Before he knew it, his hand dropped to his side and Frank was already around the corner.

Gerard had to stand there for a second or two, the spot on his hand where Frank's lips were was on fire with pins and needles, and the stars began to move again. Life was back to normal, it had always been normal, and time carried on its merry tasks. Gerard still wished that things felt less real, because now that they were picking up, they were leaving him on his ass and in a flurry, but at least it was easier to deal with than the mammoth sloth that swung the pendulums in the clock in the living room that had stopped ticking three years ago, and that no one noticed. After smiling to himself and staring at the pink splotches in his skin, he turned on his heel and, speechless, bound his way down the hall.

"Mikey!" He burst in through the door and the two were just as inseparable, sitting tangled together like ramen noodles at the bottom of the bowl, Ray's arm draped over Mikey's own as he scratched sixteen lines over each other in a sketch of a single leg. 

Mikey flinched when his brother yanked the door open, drawing a dark gray line diagonally over the page. He sighed at it, but he hadn't made much progress, so he looked up from the sheet to Gerard and the smile that unnerved him from how big it was. "What?" He matched his tone, snapping the 't' at the end like Gerard always did with the 'i' in his name.

"We were sitting on the porch, and he just asked me if he could sit on my lap, and I let him, obviously, and then we were playing truth or dare, and he asked me, on a scale of one to ten, how badly I wanted to see him, and I said ten, and then he laid his head on my chest, and-"

"Gerard." Mikey unraveled himself from Ray as Gerard basically flopped down on his bed, feet still flat on the floor. Gerard didn't stop talking.

"Then, I asked him how bad he wanted to see  _ me,  _ and he said thirteen, and then we almost fucked on the porch, but I told him no, and then as he was leaving, he kissed the palm of my hand. He kissed the  _ palm of my hand,  _ like a fucking  _ prince, _ Mikey!" Gerard was trying and failing to talk with his hands.

"Rewind there, bud." Mikey squinted at him. "You seem to have glossed over the part where you said you almost  _ fucked  _ on the  _ porch."  _

Gerard laughed, mostly to find a way to release all the nervous energy. "I guess so, fuck, I didn't even notice till he was moaning in my ear, but I'm seeing him tomorrow."

Ray raised his eyebrows.  _ "Ooo.."  _

"Don't enable him." Mikey whispered over his shoulder, but Ray didn't look like he listened to him.

"Hot date?" Ray asked, reassuringly rubbing Mikey's shoulders, which he didn't necessarily turn down or accept.

"We said we're just gonna talk and figure it out, but, hell, after the last few times I've seen him, I'm starting to wonder if the word 'talking' has a totally different meaning to humans."

"I'm starting to think it does." Ray pressed a kiss onto Mikey's neck, just below his ear. "I'm glad I could help."

_ "You  _ started this?" Mikey rolled his head back to look at Ray.

"I made him send a text saying that he missed him, the rest was all Gerard."

"Did he mean it, though?"

"I meant everything I've said tonight, that's all I'm saying. Even the part when I rated his one to ten scale with a ten."

"Do I want to know what ten means, specifically?" Ray asked, distractedly poking Mikey's nose with his finger.

"No." Mikey cut in anyway, stepping aside slightly to usher Gerard out, who was now pacing a little bit, examining the pigmentation in his hand. 

He followed the cue and giggled like an idiot all the way to his room. He had just cuddled with Frank, the first guy he'd liked in over ten years, out on the porch in the spring, and had gotten so close to sleeping with him that he almost felt like a lost cause. There was always tomorrow, he knew that, most good things came out of the renewal of the moon, but that night was like poison. But if Frank was poison, Gerard was more than happy to overdose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	15. xv

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello again! here is your long awaited chapter! this week went by really quickly but it still feels like forever since i've posted, somehow. i love vamp day.
> 
> thank you all for the love recently, i really love seeing your thoughts on this work in the comment section. keep that up, it makes my day.
> 
> i hope you all are well, if you're in the southern u.s. right now, i hope you're staying safe and warm, it's scary out there.
> 
> follow me!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

Gerard was starting to hate walking. It used to give him that precious alone time, that wondrous escape from being trapped inside wherever his heart decided to trap him, but now it was becoming a chore. A mile wasn't some digestible half hour A to B task anymore. Tonight, it was the whole damn alphabet and his racing thoughts were making him jumble up the order.

He just wanted to figure this out. He just wanted to know what the hell he was getting himself into. He just wanted to know why the hell he nearly got lucky with him, why he had taken so long to come out of his shell and look at him. Gerard had spent every outing with him restraining the strum of his heartstrings that begged Frank to reciprocate feelings to the point where he didn't even see that that's what he had been doing the entire time. Although, it wasn't like he'd been leading him on for years and years, they'd only spent a collective five days together, but he still wished that he would've turned around a little sooner.

Speaking of, he turned the corner onto Roth and he could see the little cottage half a mile down. He only ached with anticipation instead of nervousness. If his legs could move faster, his life would be easier. 

Gerard wondered what he even wanted out of this. He knew that he wanted to get things straight, but would he ask him out? Confess his feelings? Or pretend that none of last night ever happened and just call them friends? Once again, maybe he'd just wait for Frank to lay out the good sides and the bad sides for him so that he could pretend like he knew what he was jumping into. Both outcomes sounded doable to him: dating or not dating, but did they really? Was he just indifferent to the amount of heartbreak and disappointment that he'd already had to endure? Would he stick up for himself, or would that just push him away?

As slowly as the first half went, giving him time to think and peruse through his conscience, the second half was over too quickly, just as he was starting to screw his head on. Oh well, he thought, he'd figure it out. He always did.

"Hey." Gerard greeted him, sticking his hand out for him to shake as he stared endlessly into Frank's eyes. He didn't remember them looking so lively last night, despite the amount of glitter that seemed to rain from the sky while he was right on top of him.

Frank shook his hand, tight and firm grip pulling him inside. His smile was bright, even if it was just his lips that turned up. "I'm glad you could come. Want a drink?" He was already halfway to the kitchen.

"I'm fine." Gerard followed him as he detoured to the table. They sat across from each other and their feet bumped underneath it.

"So…" Frank opened the room up, laying his palms out flat on the tabletop. "What the hell are we doing?"

Gerard smiled and sighed. "Fuck if I know." Admitting defeat was much sweeter than it usually was.  _ I like you, I like you…  _ repeated in his mind. If only he could say it out loud.

"What do you want to do?" He asked, again putting Gerard on the spot like he had any clue how to handle the stage. "Because I think I know what  _ I  _ want…" His eyes trailed over him and he tried to ignore how well the show was going.

"You go first." He sputtered, struggling to regain his footing. Gerard really didn't enjoy casting the first line and it was starting to show in bold colors.

"You know I don't like being pushy." Frank straightened in his seat. "But I think I kind of am right now-"

"You're not." He interrupted, sharply, desperately trying to brush away the awkwardness of the situation, practically begging him to relieve his lungs of their exertion. "I just… I don't know how to say it."

Frank was silent this time, taking his eyes off him and tracing the bones in his hand down to his wrist where they disappeared under the skin. He looked so fucking gorgeous, he thought, and in that moment, he knew exactly what he wanted to say and how he would say it, but there was no way it'd end well. He wanted to stand there behind him, hands resting on his shoulders, fingers slithering down to touch his chest, and intermittently leaning down to kiss the top of his head until he stood up and pushed him against the wall.

Gerard just sat there, eyes darting from his hands to his own, counting down the number of severed nerves that were holding him back from touching them. This feeling wasn't fear, no, it was far from that, it wasn't that mushy, crushy feeling either, but one that left him on edge, waiting for someone to shout the words  _ 'I like you'  _ first.

"Let's start with this, okay?" Frank's voice was low and slow, soothing the tension slightly. "We're friends, right?" He moved to take Gerard's hand, but stopped himself, or maybe it was just a twitch, whatever.

Gerard nodded.

"Do you want it to stay that way?"

This was where he hesitated. If he said no, he'd risk him thinking that he didn't want his time, but if he said yes, he'd risk him thinking that he was infatuated with him, and this would be as far as they'd get.

"Let me put it this way," Frank started. "Option one is: we're friends, things stay the same, no big deal. Option  _ two, _ "  _ God,  _ Gerard wished he'd talk faster or stop talking altogether. His stomach twisted in on itself. "There's something more to this. There's gotta be something more to whatever the fuck we're doing, because I know you feel the same way, you just don't know how to express it and- honestly- neither do I."

Gerard's heart skipped a beat and jumped in his chest. He could feel it land on a rib, shooting a sharp pain around his right side. "I- I'm sorry." He couldn't bear to reveal anything yet, as badly as he wanted to. "I can't give you an answer." Gerard watched as a bulb of light in Frank's eyes died. 

"It's okay." He still comforted him, even with the chagrin in his face that he looked like he wanted to keep hidden. 

"We're here to figure it out, though, right?" He asked, trying to give him some support back. 

"I know, it's just that it's hard to work out feelings that you don't know how to label yet. I'm sorry that I rushed you into this."

"No, Frank, you didn't. You said yourself that it was okay. Is it not?"

"It is." He nodded. "It's just… I don't know what I expected. I haven't been with someone for so long that I kind of lost my touch."

"I know how that feels." Gerard looked up at him again. He hated seeing him upset, he learned.

"I think… I think I just- fuck, man- I need to answer my own question. I need to understand what the fuck I'm feeling for you first."

"Yeah…" Gerard would agree, but he was already certain on his feelings, he just didn't want to say anything yet.

"I guess this means that I'm not gonna text back for a while? I'm not entirely sure, but I just want to get things straight."

"I get that."

"And just know that it's nothing against you, sometimes it's easier for me to make up my mind if I don't have anything to do with it in front of me, you know?"

Gerard nodded.

"I'm sorry again."

"You have nothing to be sorry for." Gerard stood up behind him for a second, laying a comforting hand on Frank's shoulder. "We'll get to the bottom of this, don't worry."

Frank didn't shake it off, but Gerard sensed that he wasn't necessarily accepting it like he did the night before, so he returned his hand to his side and took one last look at him. His back was turned to him and he was still sitting alone at the table, looking like the darkest dreary little cloud. Gerard wished he could pivot on his heel and kiss him all over his sweet face to make all his labor go away, but that would only perpetuate the confusion that hung in the air of Frank's house.

Gerard left the place feeling just as uncertain as he was when he'd arrived there, but instead of wondering what  _ he  _ wanted out of it, he was left to ponder on what Frank could've possibly been trying to say. Of course, there was that part where he said that there had to be something more to whatever the fuck they were, indicating that Frank at least felt  _ something  _ of value towards Gerard, but it was something that neither of them wanted to face yet and it was making the oxygen turn itself into carbon dioxide before his lungs even got a chance to look at the molecules. 

Gerard knew that he liked him. He liked him so much that he couldn't take his mind off of him, couldn't draw without wanting to draw him, and couldn't sit in his room alone without the rising sensation of wanting to get in his pants and into his mouth. There was not a single place where he wanted to be more than anywhere Frank was, there was not a single person in this world who he wanted to see more than him, and, as far as lists went, Frank was at the top of almost all of them.

He knew that it was possible. He knew that love wasn't a shot in the dark. He just wished that the bullet would fucking hit something.

He must have cast some wicked spell over the city, because Mikey and Ray were sitting out on the porch steps, waiting for him.

"It didn't go well, did it?" Ray asked as Mikey stood up and met his brother in the driveway with open arms.

Gerard didn't say anything, but accepted Mikey's hug.

"I'm sorry." Mikey whispered, setting his chin on Gerard's shoulder.

"We all are now." Gerard replied, stroking Mikey's hair on the back of his head. "All I can do is disappoint him."

"Don't say that." Mikey dipped his chin so that he could nestle into his shoulder. "What happened?"

"We were supposed to talk about our feelings for each other but I couldn't give him an answer yet, so he didn't feel comfortable giving me one. He says he's not gonna talk to me for a while until he decides on what to say. I ruined it, Mikey, I ruined it."

"No, you didn't." He hushed him. "That's just a thing humans do. We're all wired like that, actually. People need space to think. It happens sometimes. I'm pretty sure it's nothing against you. We've done that before, remember?"

"Yeah, but me and Frank are different. I just want a boyfriend for the first time in a decade and I fucking screwed it up."

"Gee, look at me." Mikey pulled away and tilted his head to the side to get a better view of him. "You didn't do anything wrong. You stayed in your boundary and that's a good thing."

"That's the complete opposite of what I've been trying to do this entire time." Gerard couldn't decide if he wanted to run away or hug Mikey in closer.

"Hey…" Mikey's voice was soft and comforting, cooing like it always was. "Come sit down." He led him to the steps next to Ray. "Now, start from the beginning. Why didn't you feel like you could tell him?"

Gerard took a big breath. "I don't know, I didn't want to be too upfront. I don't want to scare him off, I don't know what I'm doing."

"You know what you feel, don't you?" Ray rubbed his arm in sympathy.

"Of course I do, I've known since the first time I saw him that he stood out from all the others, but I don't know why I'm holding it back all of a sudden. He's given me every chance that he possibly can and I've blown right past all of them."

"What makes you think that?" Gerard was especially thankful for the gentleness of Mikey's tone that night.

"I left feeling like I hurt him. He told me he knows what he wants, I know what  _ I  _ want, but neither of us want to say anything. I'm starting to think that this isn't gonna work-"

"Don't say that, Gee." Mikey rubbed long lines in his back.

"Since when do you think it will?" Gerard squinted his nearly crying eyes at him.

Mikey shrugged.

"What do I do, Ray?" Gerard switched to resting his swimming head on Ray's shoulder.

"I think you know." He replied.

Gerard sighed at this. He did.

"What could we do for you in the meantime?" Ray asked, patting Gerard's leg.

"Get me a fucking drink. He offered me some earlier but I didn't have anything. I don't know how I did all that sober."

"Do you want blood in it?" Ray immediately clicked his tongue. "Dumb question. Of course you do." Holding Gerard still, he guided him to the table and into the same chair he always sat in while he got the drink ready.

"I owe you an apology." Mikey said, reaching out for Gerard's hand from across the table.

"Mikey, please- you don't-"

"I  _ do."  _ He insisted. "I'm sorry for not supporting you when you needed it the most. I can't be both our parents for you  _ and  _ for myself, and I can't be your brother at the same time."

Gerard nodded, waiting for the rest to come pouring out. Maybe someone would tell him something tangible for the first time in way too long.

"I don't know why I ever made you feel like you had to get my permission to live. I don't know why I made you depend on me-"

"You didn't  _ make me,  _ Mikey-"

"Yes, I did. Just  _ let me  _ be sorry for once, please? I don't want you taking all the blame. I've never wanted that. I've never wanted you to be the only one that's ever done anything wrong.  _ I'm  _ the one who turned you.  _ I'm  _ the one who projected all that nasty shit onto you.  _ I'm  _ the one that imprisoned you in my little bubble so that nothing would ever hurt you because I wanted you to believe that you were still keeping me safe like you used to." Mikey chewed on the inside of his cheek. "Falling in love is when you're the most vulnerable, and I completely shut you out. I never told you that I liked Ray. I never tell you anything. I don't even know you at all."

Ray returned with a glass of rum and blood for him, planting a kiss on the top of Mikey's head as he passed by him to sit just as close to him as the gods intended.

"We've gotten so far, you know?" He continued. "If you can say that you hate me for turning you, then you can acknowledge that I'm just as monstrous as you call yourself. If you're gonna say something bad about yourself, you're including me in that statement. Just let me be sorry."

Gerard threw his head back as he downed half the glass in one go, listening to the collective cardiac output of the room and its steadiness. He was alive. So was everyone else. The state of death that he'd always thought was endless, its infinite borders reaching farther past the reaches of realms they had never even imagined before, was now growing quickly finite, and the walls were only made of paper mache that he could just spit on and easily topple. The past five years of being miserable, reanimated corpses were looking more and more like a waste every second.

"How long have you felt like this, Mikey?" Gerard searched around his mouth for more of the metallic taste. 

"For a month now, I think. Ray's really helped me get it out. You've been locking yourself away so much that it gave me space to think. It helps, you know? See?"

"So… you agree? It's easier when I'm out of everyone's way?" Gerard drank the rest, hoping once again that there'd be some magical anecdote at the bottom. There never was.

"I didn't mean it like that. I meant like… space is good, but only if you come back at the end. Only if those gates are closed, but unlocked."

"I just don't know what to do about… about him."

"And that's okay. He'll tell you when he's ready to. He told you things between you two were fine, so they are. Just know that- Gerard, I'm sorry. I'm sorry for the way I've treated you, for absolutely everything. I shouldn't have made you feel like that. I know that you know that I thought I was just trying to protect you, but I can see what you mean now. I get what you were trying to tell me now."

Gerard wanted to comfort him so badly, to tell him that he shouldn't be so down on himself and that everything would be okay, but he forced himself to accept the apology he'd been begging almost two months for. He just wanted to stand up and say that he'd been too commandeering lately and that he shouldn't have pushed the idea of Frank into everyone's heads so quickly, but the conversation grounded him. He had no choice but to take a deep breath and take it all in.

"It's okay if you hate me for this too." Mikey reached out and curled one of his fingers around Gerard's. "I want you to be happy. I wasn't making you happy."

"You don't have to-"

"Stop." He cut him off, shooting the saddest, most remorseful look at him through the lenses of his glasses. If the color gray was a glare… "You said it yourself: we're not stupid kids anymore. You've been carrying so much blame on your back for our entire lives. Let me take what's mine. I just want to be your little brother."

"I don't want this to mean that we lose each other." Gerard whimpered, refusing to look at his brother for fear that he might disappear before his eyes.

"It never will." Mikey reassured him. 

This was going to be something that Gerard would grapple with for a very long time. The shame and the guilt that resided in its happy little village inside of his red blood cells were going to have to burn their houses down to make room for the recovering souls that he'd been neglecting for so long: victims of the addiction to endless dark nights all alone that he expected to get clean entirely on their own.

He knew that Mikey was right about all the things he'd said, he knew that no one really knew him, he knew that he didn't even know himself for Christ's sake, but processing the sheer amount of grief that he held was going to be a monumental task. Everything under the fabric made sense: that feeling of protection, seclusion, isolation, that obligation to make sure that his little brother was okay with every single word that came out of his mouth, everything. What he would give to take it all back…

"Gee, I wouldn't leave you all alone even if the fate of the universe depended on it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	16. xvi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's vamp day!!! i'm so excited to give you guys this chapter, it's a nice long one that took me Forever to finish. thank you for all the love on the last chapter, i appreciate it so much <3
> 
> big newz! i got into community college! in august i will officially be a freshman and i'm very excited about it!!! and because of all of the work i have to do for school combined with college prep, i've been really slow to writing the chapter after this one, so now that i have time to, i'll be sure to make it a bangin chapter for you guys xx
> 
> ok!! enough of the blabber talk!! on with it!
> 
> follow mee!  
> ig-amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

The summer air was hot that night. Humid, tepid, boiling over. It wasn't even summer yet, anyway. They all sat around a vent on the hardwood floor that was blasting out freezing cold air conditioner breeze, barely saying a word besides the occasional moan and groan. Gerard was on his fifteenth ice cube of the night. Realistically, it wasn't really that hot in the house, it was only eighty degrees outside, but something about the humidity just made them go crazy.

In a week, it was going to be a month since Gerard had heard anything from Frank. He'd resisted attending the weekly meetings for fear of the guests' persistence on pulling information out of him, any time where he had to even think about that boy was dreadful and made his chest hurt. Nevertheless, he couldn't get himself to stop thinking about him. He couldn't form a sentence without wondering what little words Frank would throw into it, he couldn't look out the window without hoping that one of his favorite animals would come grazing by, he couldn't even drink his morning coffee without aching to ask him how he liked his own.

"I hate this." Ray brushed his hair back from his face with his hand, pulling his tired fingers all the way back through every tangled curl. "I hate seeing you like this."

"Join the club." Mikey sighed, finishing off another cup of water.

"Imagine being me." Gerard furrowed his brow. "It's not even hot." He said, tongue numb from sucking on an ice cube that was far too big for his mouth.

"You need to just call him." Ray said, sinking back against the wall to shut his eyes. He looked like he was finally cooling off.

"I can't." Gerard didn't even feel for his phone. He'd been rejecting that as a possibility at all because, if he let himself believe that there was even a slight chance that he'd pick up, he wouldn't be able to function.

"At least get out of the house, the meeting should start in a couple hours, maybe that would help you." Ray suggested.

"I already told you, they're just gonna ask about him."

"Then don't answer. None of their business."

"All they talk about is feed this, feed that, oh, Gerard! Nice fangs you got there, what are they for again? Oh, biting sexy guys? Didn't you say you were talking to this guy? What's he like again? I can't take that. I can barely get my own mind to shut up about him when I'm alone." Gerard rubbed his face.

"You should go see Ruth." Ray added, again, earning a sharp glance from Mikey.

"You think she wants to talk to me either? I haven't been able to get a word out of her since…" He trailed off, trying to recall the last time they'd talked. He shrugged.

"Dude, it's only been two months. You've gone longer than that without talking to  _ me,  _ and look, I'm still around." Mikey pointed at himself.

"I guess…" Gerard leaned back on his hands on the floor, trying to muster up the courage to walk a couple miles in the nasty air outside.

"I don't think you should be walking out there, Gee." Mikey patted his shoulder. "Especially not in the state you've been in."

"Thanks, Mikey." He relaxed into his slouched posture again.

"I'm just saying, I know it isn't a good idea. Ray has her number still, just call her and ask her if you can hang out. She's cool." Mikey sounded like he was choking on every word, carefully watching each syllable as they formed in his throat.

Ray handed him his phone and he stared at the screen for a second before he tapped her contact and waited for it to ring. This was only further solidifying his hatred for doing things first. She picked up immediately.

_ "Ray? Is something wrong? Why are you- oh. Hi, Gerard."  _ She almost sounded disappointed, but that was better than having to hear her panic.

"Sorry." He apologized, squeezing his thumb in his fist in his other hand.

_ "It's nothing, I'm just not used to him calling me. What's up?" _

Gerard looked up at Ray, who gave him a thumbs up. He rolled his eyes. "Can I see you? I just need to talk to someone who isn't my brother."

_ "Oh, yeah, sure. Is everything okay?" _

"Yeah, yeah, everything's fine. Just need a friend, I guess."

_ "Of course, of course. Do you need me to pick you up? We could go somewhere that's nice and cool, or I could just bring you back to my place, meet the missus." _

Gerard gulped. "I'd love to meet her."

Ray looked at him like he was winning a medal that he ran the race for, sticking his palms out in front of him.

_ "Cool, I'll be there in a few."  _ She hung up.

Gerard handed the phone back to Ray. "She's gonna pick me up soon." He stood up and patted Mikey on the head. Not for any particular reason, it was just something little that he'd been liking to do lately. He'd said that he wanted him to treat him like a little brother, so he did so promptly.

"Good." Ray looked up at him, relief subtly forming behind his eyes. "You'll have a nice time."

Gerard didn't say anything else. He just buttoned a fresh black shirt over his tee and rolled the sleeves up. He was gonna try his hardest to talk about something other than Frank, but he knew that Ruth could read his mind, so that act wouldn't last long with her. Regardless, she would notice. It was nice being around someone that was so observant, someone who could see right into your voice and pluck out the waves that didn't look right so that she could inject you with healing. He'd only really talked to her once, but it was solid enough in his mind that he could long for that understanding.

A little white car pulled into the driveway and Gerard flinched at the headlights that flashed through the curtains of his bedroom. He let Mikey hug his legs as he walked past him before he pulled himself free and shut the door behind him.

"Hi." He said, buckling himself into the passenger seat that smelled like ocean water.

Ruth didn't say anything at first, she just looked at him with round eyes for a second. "You have got a  _ lot  _ to say." She sighed and pulled back out onto the street. 

It was a special kind of comfort that Gerard couldn't explain to be around another vampire who just  _ got it.  _ Sure, he sorta had that with Mikey and Ray, but it was nothing like being alone with someone who could actually see into him. Someone who knew that feeling of longing like the back of her hand, someone who shared the same heart and the same mind.

He wasn't sure where time went, he'd just been looking out the window so that his mind didn't implode and leak all over her car, but as soon as he watched the little green road sign for Carter pass around the corner, he blinked and they'd stopped again in an unfamiliar, well groomed circle drive surrounded by neatly trimmed red rose bushes.

"Sorry for such a long drive." She hummed. "I doubt that you noticed."

"How long was that?" He asked, following her up the pavement to the front step that was shaded by a yellow gingham awning.

"Half an hour, but I like to speed things up a bit. Memory games are fun." She chuckled and softly opened the door, walking a ways ahead of Gerard to greet her girlfriend in the kitchen.

He could hear their affectionate cooing from the entryway, awkwardly pulling his shoes off and leaving them on the mat.

"Oh, Rosey, this is my friend, Gerard." She came suavely around the corner with her trailing behind her, hand in hand.

Gerard waved at her, choking back a spill of emotions that he couldn't identify yet.

"It's so nice to meet you! Rue's told me about your family a couple times, it's weird that she goes so far back with your brother, yet I've never seen you." She shook his hand with both of her own soft, loving ones.

"Yeah, Mikey's the favorite child." He laughed to himself, avoiding eye contact with her in case she also had the power to drain all his secrets.

"No!" She drew the vowel out with a smile on her face. "I'm sure that's not true."

Gerard shook his head. "Who knows?"

"Here, do you want some tea? I just made some chamomile as Ruth was coming home, it's a bit late so it might help ease your nerves."

Gerard couldn't refuse, no matter how hard he tried. "That would be awesome, thank you."

Ruth led him to sit down on one of their floral printed couches that reminded him of his mother's sitting room in her closet that he always got yelled at for going into, cozy and quaint like its own private world. She sat down on the one directly across from him.

"She doesn't stay up too late, she's way better than me." Ruth folded her hands in her lap, staring off at her red curls as they swayed and bounced while she moved. "I'm so in love with her."

"Gay." Gerard mumbled, making fun of how bright her eyes were.

She shot back to look at him, squishing her face up. "Oh, shut up. Don't act like that isn't the exact reason you're here."

Rosemary returned with a tiny cream colored mug filled with iced tea and set a pot of honey on the coffee table in front of him. "I know it's hot out there." She was wearing simple white pajamas that matched. The top had short sleeves and the bottoms were folded above her ankles, both with light pink little flowers on them.

"Thanks so much." He looked up at her and saw nothing but kindness in her face. He could understand why Ruth was so entranced by her.

"Well, I'm off to bed. I know Ruth likes to stay up late so you two have your night. I have to wake up at five tomorrow to go to the garden because Mabel says my tomatoes bloomed!" Rosemary lit up and her eyes were big. Gerard tasted a tangy, salty spice under his tongue and tried to imagine Frank looking at him like that. She leaned down to kiss Ruth on the forehead. "Goodnight, love." 

"Goodnight, dulce." Ruth picked up her hand and kissed her knuckles before she turned on her heels and headed down the hall. Neither of them moved until they heard her door shut.

"Dude," Gerard started, looking at Ruth now.  _ "Lucky." _

"The luckiest in the world." Her eyes lingered on the empty corridor for a moment before she continued. "So, tell me. What's on your mind?"

Gerard drizzled a bit of honey into his tea, watching it settle on the ice cubes, and took a sip of it. "Everything."

She chuckled. "Well now, we can't go over  _ everything.  _ Why don't you start with the reason that boy's got you in such an acid rain pond."

"How can you-" Gerard squinted at her.

"Gerard, like I'm sure many people have told you before, I'm not a psychic. You're just an open book." She folded her legs under her. "What happened?"

"I haven't talked to him in almost a month."

Ruth raised her eyebrows. "Why?"

"Well," He started, giving in to the breaking of the levee. "I texted him one night saying that I missed him, and then he showed up at my house. He sat on my lap and laid on my chest and we almost slept together."

"How is that a bad thing?" She asked.

"I've only seen him face to face- like- four times before that. I've had a crush on him for a long time but I thought that he thought we were just friends. He wasn't even drunk or anything."

"I see, I see." She nodded. "He has feelings for you."

Gerard's breath hitched. "He said he does." He pulled at his own fingers. "I saw him the next night and we tried to figure out what was going on between us, but neither of us were ready to say anything. So, we just haven't talked since."

"How long ago was this?" 

"The middle of May."

Ruth looked at him. Gerard could feel her eyes on him and hear the gears turning in her head. "You regret that, don't you?" She shifted to the edge of her seat. "Did you tell him what you wanted?"

Gerard shook his head. "Neither of us could admit it. We both know the answer…" He swallowed a lump in his throat. "We just can't say it."

"Okay." Her voice was low and soothing. "You can say it to me."

Gerard looked up at her, finally. "I want him. I want him so bad. I want to spend every waking minute with him and never take my hands off of his beautiful fucking body. I want to hold him and kiss him and touch him and fuck him and there's nothing I can fucking do about it." He caught his breath, throat spasming in between gasps.

"I know." She said, still comforting him like a cool summer pool. "I know you feel helpless. I know you feel scared, intimidated, and alone. I know that there may not be anything you can do to make this feeling go away- and, quite frankly- I don't think it  _ should  _ go away. The love you have for him is gorgeous, okay? All you can do right now is just to remind him that you're here. Show him that you're still willing to make that connection, even if it's not the relationship you want right now. You  _ have  _ to start slow. I can't emphasize that enough. You'll get what you want, I promise you, though."

"Really?" Gerard filled his mouth all the way up with tea. It calmed him down.

"Of course. It's like I told you last time. It's always possible. You just have to show that you'll try."

"What do I do first?" He paused, making direct eye contact with her. "Ruth, I think I'm in love with him."

She smiled a little. "Good."

Gerard's heart skipped a couple beats. It was freeing to finally confess it. He was in love with Frank and now there was no turning back. He wasn't sure that there ever  _ was,  _ but the cement that he'd thrown himself into was drying and it was comfortable as hell.

"I think you already know what to do, Gerard. I think you just needed someone to put it in order for you." She briefly touched Gerard's hand from across the coffee table. 

"I um… I don't think I can see him just yet." He stuttered, already picturing Frank's soft, delicate body against his again, and how easy telling him how he felt would bring that right back into reality.

"Sure you can." She said. "I see it in you. You want to  _ so bad." _

"I do." He confirmed, anxiously crossing one of his legs over the other to keep from bouncing them. "I want him more than anything."

"Then follow your heart before it chases you. You won't be able to outrun it by that point, and it'll run you up the wall until you just have to jump down because you're so desperate for contact with the ground. He's only yours if he knows he is." 

"Do you think I should tell him?"

"Not yet. Just  _ be.  _ All you two need is to  _ be.  _ After enough of that, you'll both know when the time will come."

Gerard sniffled to keep his tears inside. "Thanks, Ruth."

"Don't thank me. You can do this all by yourself." She reached out to shake his hand. "I know you can."

Gerard shook his head a bit. He knew that he'd be nothing on his own, but decided to let her feel like she was just a gust in his sails.

"So, anything else?"

-

Monday tastes like lemon and vanilla buttercream. Monday morning tastes like a cup of ambition and a teaspoon of madness. Monday night tastes like cigarette smoke and salt. 

"I'm sorry." Gerard coughed and caught his breath, smearing a streak of ash on his chin. He honestly didn't even like smoking anymore. Why the hell did he still do it? 

"Why?" Ray was tugging at a loose thread in his blue jeans. The knee was starting to tear. 

"That I'm such a motherfucking handful." He took a long drag, following the glide of the constellations in their ever expanding endeavors as the smoke rose towards them. 

"Who says I don't like keeping a grip on you?" Ray pulled the thread all the way out and straightened the denim. There was a neat wrinkle where the fabric was torn. Little pinprick holes sprung up on either side of it. 

"I could have sworn that roommates don't like having to deal with each other's bullshit."

"That's bullshit." He replied, swatting away a mosquito. "Is this still about Frank?" 

"It always fucking is." There was a hint of frustration in his tone that he'd let slip, revealing the decades old landfill inside of him that was sixty feet deep and sixty feet tall with anger and malice. It all piled up and down towards Hades and Paradise where he was sitting on the divide, serene on the River Styx: as above, so below.

"Listen, I understand the-" 

"I'm sorry, Toro, again, but you really don't." Gerard cut in, lazily. "You and Mikey fell in love instantly. You talked to each other for fifteen minutes and I haven't been able to get either of you alone for two months."

Ray turned his torso to face him. "Do you know how long I waited to tell him? Do you know how long I fought with it? With myself? Do you know how afraid I was for those two years until I told you about him? If anyone understands between the two of us, it's me." 

"I didn't know tha-" 

"And I don't expect you to. Nobody tells anybody shit and that's just the way it is around here. Why else do you think Ruth was my confidant for all those years? I didn't feel like I could talk to anyone about being bi or whatever, and she helped with that."

"I'm sorry you felt like you couldn't come to me till recently, Ray." Gerard finished the cigarette and snuffed it out with his shoe. "I'm glad that you eventually did, though." 

"Me too. And trust me, that was the best decision I've made. That's why I want you to be honest about how you feel about… about Frank."

"What would that mean?" He asked, scratching an itch behind his ear. He must have gotten a bug bite, he thought, and he was right, because he flicked a dead mosquito from his thigh. Toxic blood, you work wonders. 

"I mean, obviously, if going these long stints without talking to him tears you up this much, you're not meant to do them. I know Ruth told you not to see him one hundred percent just yet, and I trust that, but total isolation isn't working. If just seeing him as a friend means seeing him  _ at all,  _ then that's your medicine."

"I don't know how much longer I can take this." Gerard bit his lip to keep from crying. He didn't know why his first reaction to literally everything was to cry all of a sudden, but it was getting real damn hard to fight. "I  _ want  _ him." 

"I feel that." Ray clutched Gerard's shoulder. "This is how you get him." 

Gerard took in what Ray said for a moment, wringing his hands together. "Do you think this'll be worth it?" 

"Gee, we're immortal.  _ Everything  _ is worth the wait."

-

Gerard stared anxiously at his phone screen and the message he was psyching himself up to send.  _ 'can i see you on tuesday?'  _ sounded like something innocent enough, but after nearly a month of zero contact, it was more intimidating than being asked to climb a loose boulder blindfolded. With each second his finger grew closer to the button until his muscles twitched and tapped it before he was ready, but there was nothing he could do now.

_ 'hey. tuesday. one. be there.'  _ Frank responded almost immediately. Maybe he'd been thinking of him… 

He didn't sound angry, he didn't sound happy, he just sounded neutral and Gerard fucking hated it. He wished he'd say something that could mean something, but he knew that it would just make him reel and melt into a puddle of every emotion he'd ever despised. He also suggested a time that was in the smack middle of the day, which would never work, even in the wildest of his dreams.

_ 'can we do eight instead?'  _ Gerard swallowed that same boulder in his throat before it slid off the mountainside.

_ 'yeah.'  _

That was good enough for him.

"I'm gonna see him on Tuesday." Gerard announced, bleakly, sitting on Mikey's bed and watching him read at his desk.

"That's nice." His tone was almost robotic, fully focused on his story but still wanting to listen to his brother talk. "Did you talk about anything else?"

"No." Gerard realized how pathetic that sounded.

"Well, I guess there's a time for that." Mikey turned the page. There were only four words on this one and the chapter ended. He stuck a scrap of paper in between the pages and shut the book gently. "How do you want it to go?"

Gerard bit the inside of his cheek. "I honestly don't care anymore. I mean- I still want to see him- I just gave up on having expectations."

"That's fair." Mikey tapped his nails on the hard cover. "Start with that."

"I seriously have to wait a week?" Gerard slouched, pitying himself, hoping that Mikey would do the same and give him some half-hearted affirmation. At this point, something half baked was better than something raw. 

"We live forever. How long is a week?" 

Gerard shrugged. "I just wish I could fix everything."

"Shocker." Mikey chuckled but quickly rescinded it. 

"I want him to be okay. I want forever to be tolerable. I want every little thing to turn out perfect, but I know that it never will. I don't know what to do about that and I don't expect anyone else to." 

"There you go." Mikey's posture opened up a little more. "Maybe sitting inside your head does you good." 

"Maybe…" 

"Look, I'm gonna be honest with you; I can't help you. I don't know what to say, or do… I don't have anything important for you. All I can do is listen and that's all you need."

"But… you've always had something " Gerard's voice went high like it was when he talked to Mikey when they were younger: that story-book big-eyed stare. 

"I was just taking all the pieces that you dumped out onto my floor and putting them together. You've never needed me to be wise, you've only needed me to show you that you're right."

Gerard picked at his thumb nail. 

"Because all this weight has been on you to protect me and always be the one who always knew everything, to the point where you don't even know what you don't know anymore. Your mind has slipped so far away from you that you have to have people help you wrangle the leash in."

"Where have you been?" Gerard's throat was scratchy from gulping down the spasms. It shut while he talked and he had to swallow to catch his breath again. 

"I've always been with you, nothing has ever changed. I've just been waiting for you to find the missing pieces, and each time you've come to me lately, you've brought me another one." 

"Do you think we're almost done yet?" Gerard could feel his youth blooming again in his voice. 

_ "You're  _ getting close. Like I said, I'm just rearranging your puzzle, but that doesn't mean you're doing it alone, though." 

"So… it'll be okay with Frank?" 

"Gee, you already know the answer to that. But, for the sake of the picture on the front of the box, yes. Despite the disparity, things always turn out okay around here." 

-

Everyone wished that life had smoother transitions. Everyone thought that it'd be easier if the scenes didn't all blur together while the interesting bits stabbed like silver daggers. Memory was consequently episodic; torn pieces of film, gnashed teeth, and flash photography. Gerard could have sworn that it was still Tuesday night. It wasn't. It was Sunday already and he was losing his composure. Disoriented, he watched the tasks unfold before his eyes that prepared him for the trip over to the basement, auto-pilot drone catching in his hair and taking little strands of it. All the time between now and Tuesday was becoming one singular unit instead of the snapshots of moonlit night that it was supposed to be.

If only he could remember how he'd ended up a mile and a half from home, the muscle memory must have taken over. He could hear a hundred and four heart beats going at ninety two beats per minute each and he only woke up from his zone out when he noticed how much faster they made him walk.

"Gee!" Ruth popped out from the crowd and took his hand, leading him down the steps and into that little hallway they stood in before. "Can I talk to you?" 

"Sure, Rue." 

"Sorry I was so distant before, I shouldn't have left you without the support you needed then." 

"Hey now, why is everybody suddenly so guilty?" He scratched the side of his head. "Every person I've talked to lately has been coming to me all sorry." 

"Times are changing." She said, still holding on to his hand and fretting her eyes around so that they could fill with the darkness of the room at different angles. The light outside was tinted red. "Rosemary found out."

"About?" Gerard felt like he kind of knew, but he didn't want to assume right away. 

"She knows about… about _ me _ . I left a pouch of blood out on the table like an idiot and I couldn't explain it. We spent that month trying to figure out what to do about us, and when you called me last Sunday, I was just getting ready to tell you that she's gonna have her turning ceremony on Wednesday for Litha."

"Oh my God, really? How did that go?" 

"She gets it, somehow. I have no idea how the fuck she still loves me but I've been surprised by her since day one. She wants to spend forever with me, Gerard. I'm going to wake up next to her for all of eternity, and I have no idea where to start."

"I think you do." Gerard squeezed her hand in his. "You don't have to be sorry when things are going like they are."

"I know… I guess I had a lot on my plate."

"You did. I'm glad that it's working out for you."

"Thanks, so am I." She let go of Gerard's hand and he was hit with a wave of cold. "Did they work out for you?" 

Gerard hesitated. He hoped that they would, but he wasn't quite sure if they really had yet. "I don't know yet. I think so."

"That's right, you told me about that problem you had. You're seeing him on Tuesday, right?" 

"Yeah…" He bit his lip. "I'm so fucking nervous because I know it isn't time to talk about it yet, but I want it to be so bad. I want him so bad."

"Your family is coming around and so is my world. Times are changing, Gee, everyone can fucking taste it. Everytime a new vampire is made, the world shivers a bit. Tonight, she's starting to chill." 

"It's the sabbat, isn't it?" Gerard glanced at the large, wooden Wheel of the Year hanging on the wall across from the corridor that was turned most of the way from Beltane towards Litha. There were only three days left. 

"It's always the sabbat. That's what humans turn to when they sense this magic. Pagans are intricate little creatures and we love them dearly, but sometimes the mystics don't go as deep as they find comfort in believing." Ruth's fang looked sharp in the night, sly and glamorous like the fashion Gerard missed so much. "I'm so glad you're here."

"So am I."

"Come with me, let's blow this joint." Ruth took Gerard's hand again and out they went just as quickly as they'd arrived. 

Somehow the night was stained with this exhilarating smear, like the halo around street lights that makes you realize how astigmatic your eyes have grown over the years, like the dizziness of the cracks in the sidewalk as your friends are walking a little too fast for how much booze they've drank, like the stab of the freedom of the summer when you know you have nothing to stress over. That night was summer in its purest form, running all over town with this girl and her stories and her wisdom, finally revisiting the shrill of youth. The dream of living forever was no longer just a manic high that matures too quickly at the bottom of a bottle of spirit, it was a reality that was a luxurious velvet color. Infinity was still young. 

"Look at all of them." Ruth stopped suddenly and turned to face the congregation outside the steps. "They're all fucking miserable. All of them. I can assure you that not a single one of those motherfuckers has ever or will ever feel love. No one feels what we do. No one else is on top of the world like we are." 

Gerard looked from the crowd to Ruth. He sure as hell didn't want to be alone on top of the world, especially without Frank, but the night was too joyous to be caught up in company. The love he felt was real and the fact that no one but her understood it and could see it, touch it, feel it, was a new breed of intimacy. For the first affection in a decade, this was a damn good one. 

"Let's go see him. Show me where you hide." She let go of his hand again and let him lead her at his own pace. 

At this point, Gerard was purely desperate to see him at all, so he took her hand back and walked ahead of her. The forest looked so inviting; something about that same dopamine rush pulled him in closer for another fill. Each tree was another pillar that supported the marble palace. 

It was two miles from home to the cave, two miles back in the right direction, and then another mile and a half to Frank's house. Gerard had walked an obscene amount of miles that night and he just knew his legs would be sore tomorrow. Somehow, it really didn't phase him, despite how long it'd been since he'd gone out like this, isolation is no good for the joints. Oh well, he walked fast and his pleading heart yanked time along with it. 

There was nothing new to add about the enchanting lull of the woods. There was nothing that was out of place, not a single branch had moved from where he'd left it before, but every branch seemed to curl and hug him in. The brush was soft and pillowy under their feet as the dew waited to bead up in tiny, intricate masonry on delicate blades of grass that the deer hadn't nibbled at yet. The solstice was so close that Gerard could almost taste the pollen. The little house on Roth glowed as per usual and there was a pair of stilettos laying in the lot to the right. Gerard wondered if even a single second had gone by since the last time he'd been there.

And there he was, just like last time, like clockwork. His hand pulled the curtain close to his throat and his eyes strained up at the sky like they were trying to discern the meaning of the placement of the stars for the very first time. Oh, how dreamily he stood, how badly Gerard wanted to forget about this introduction and run to him so that he could throw his arms around him and make it all okay. Once again, a man of control maintains his posture. The linen sealed so privately around the open space gave Gerard a bad taste and made him think that maybe he knew he was here, he was hiding someone that he liked better, but he wanted to make sure that he was the centerpiece of the bouquet. He definitely fucking was.

"So…" Ruth leaned against the tree that Gerard had perched on the first time he saw Frank. He felt himself get slightly possessive over it, but it was too particular of an issue to get all worked up over. He'd gotten riled up enough the past few months. "That's it?"

"Give him a minute." Gerard pointed one of his fingers in the air. "He's got that look."

"He has a look? You already know his looks?" 

"I know enough."

Sure enough, his image in the streaky, blessed window vanished, and no sooner did it materialize again in the box of orange casting a shadow on the garden floor. His stupid garlic plants were getting taller. A cloud of smoke danced over his head and he leaned against the fence to face the woods.

They both stood frozen in their respective spots, knowing not to move in case he had a hunter's eye, but not worried enough to hide. Frank's eyes were at half mast and he held a joint between two of his forefingers. He didn't care.

Ruth ran her eyes up and down as slowly as she could. "This is like sticking a finger in your heart, Gee." She whispered.

He scrunched his face up and turned to look at her. "Now, that's one I haven't heard."

"You have a dark red puddle around you and this time it's not blood. If soulmates are actually real, every molecule of his body and spirit was made with you in mind."

Gerard sighed through his nose. "Don't give me that honor before midnight. That's heartache for moonset so that the sky has enough room for me to shoot all that shit into the space that the asteroids left."

"Keep it in your ribs one of these days. Burying how you feel about him doesn't pack the cut like you think it does. You have to pile on the love and the lust and the irremovable lust and wrap a bandage around it as tight as you can stand it until all of it seeps in and seals itself beneath your skin. That's how you heal. You don't have to tell me those things, but figure them out one of these days, okay?"

"I have." Gerard twitched as his rigid muscles still hadn't moved. "I know it all already. I'm the encyclopedia of love."

"And let me guess, he can't read or some cringing bullshit-"

"No," Gerard cut in rather sharply, finally shifting his weight onto his other leg. "He's a procrastinator. There's a deadline somewhere in time and he's gonna wait till the very last second to reel me in like a shark that's just bit a goldfish."

"I see." Ruth took one last look at Frank before she mirrored Gerard and they only paid glances to the garden. They were deep enough into the woods that the canopy encased them in its safe veil. "I know, right?"

Gerard hummed. He wished he could find the word for what it felt like when Ruth saw into his mind. He wished he could find the word for what she was easily understanding.

"You don't have to know everything." She cooed. "I know that you know what you're feeling, and that's all you need right now. We live forever. There's always gonna be time to unlock every secret of the atoms that make this place dense enough to tolerate. Focus on what you  _ can  _ reach."

"I can't reach him here." Gerard's voice dropped while he watched Frank snuff out his joint and open the door again. The returning light was his last glimpse at the frozen hands of the clock. 

"You just did, though. You know what weed does to people? I'm willing to bet that his lungs weren't the only organs in his chest that were burning tonight." Ruth stretched her arm across her chest, working out the stiffness. "You cast a spell over this place and it shows. Do you see how the trees bend for you? Do you see how the plants unfold to make room for the adoration you carry? How the humidity turns to liquid in your hair because of your body heat? The atmosphere stretches and molds to accommodate. You water this soil with caring hands and you don't even notice it. I guarantee you that you reach him without trying most of the time, and he can reach you just fine."

Gerard sniffled. He wasn't in a crying mood, despite how incredibly moving that was, but it was more of an impulse that kicked in to keep all of his organs in place. He really wished he knew why. Gerard really wished he knew more things right now besides drink, smoke, fuck, and cry.

"I hate to cut you off in such a heavy moment, but I have a ceremony to prepare for in a few days and…"

"Oh, no problem." Gerard pushed his weight off of the trunk of the tree and started towards the path. 

Although, the last thing he remembered was Ruth wrapping her arm around his shoulders and an overwhelming feeling of satisfaction. They'd jumped forward again and he'd blinked the sleep and the street light from his eyes in the front seat of her car. She'd stopped softly in his driveway and he'd shut the door understanding that time was never linear, but it always comes around whenever the fuck it feels like it. He'd walked right through Mikey and Ray and settled at his desk with the lingering notion that it was starting to fucking feel like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


	17. xvii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy vamp day!!! i'm always excited to deliver content to you guys and today is no exception. i really hope you like this chapter!!!
> 
> i also recently bought a keyboard for my laptop and it's pastel pink and lights up so i am a very happy man. writing is ten times more fun when your keyboard makes yummy clicks!! also, i made myself a new carrd site that took two hours and im so proud of it that im just showing it off everywhere. go check it out if you'd like at california-2019.carrd.co
> 
> and without further ado, here's those fruity vampire boys ;)
> 
> socialz!  
> ig- amnesiarts  
> twt- thedevilscrimes  
> lj- pennilessheroes  
> tmblr- upthroughmyheart

Gerard woke up at exactly seven o'clock. He hated that he always woke up so quote-unquote  _ early  _ before big events, he was used to just rolling out of bed and out the door. Things that make you nervous tend to want you to suffer for as long as they can stand to pluck the strings of the puppet. The days were getting longer. Summer was starting to mature. It was nowhere near dark enough to function at that time, so Gerard rolled over to turn his back to the window and pulled the covers over his head again.

It wasn't that he didn't want to see Frank, he would do anything to feel his hand snake around his shoulders and his legs intertwining with his, and, most of all, the sweet friction in his hips as he rocked and whimpered and moaned, but the impending doom of having to face him as no one ruined the excitement. He hated the steps backwards, the malrotation, the jaundice, and the gangrene that was setting into his deathly skin, making him look more like the image of the monster that he saw inside his head. He hadn't thought about food in a long, long time. He hadn't even wondered what the other guys would eat, all he'd been doing was shutting himself in his own little bubble with the photographs and the sweaty skin under his knees from how hard he had to tense them to imagine what those gentle touches would feel like. Nothing could ever match him, he knew this, but somehow, trying his best was getting him through the time loop.

Was there something he was missing? Was there something that he could reach out for that would kick-start  _ something  _ inside of him to make the gears turn? It was stupid that Gerard was sure that he was sure and that Frank was too, whatever was holding them back was celestial and just out of range. It was stupid how often he had to wreck and wrack his brain to try and figure out if there was a bolt undone. He was in perfect working order, but the time and place were askew somehow and he had no control over either of them. That  _ 'wrong place, wrong time'  _ bullshit always irked him; maybe it was the immortality of his time and the certainty of his place, but it just had never seemed like an issue before this. Or maybe that was the exact reason for all the misfortune he'd been fighting with over the recent years. Maybe that was the reason his impulsive jumpiness had been drawing dividing lines in between him and his family for so long. Once you discover you're gonna live forever, you tend to live life on a whim since it's pretty damn hard to kill you, but it gets you into messes when you forget that time still isn't linear on your graph. The Earth still turns, the sun still rises and sets, the weather still changes and shits on all your plans; there's no alternate universe in which you inhabit, you're still just as human as you were before or as you are inside, your body just accepts the venom and moves the hell on as usual.

And, yeah, maybe it was possible for this to just be a heavenly mistake in divine timing, angels don't always have clean hands when they commit the crimes of God, and the Devil doesn't even have a track record anymore. Whoever was controlling the passage of eternity must have been drinking when they introduced Frank to Gerard.

Mikey tapped on his door with the knuckles of his first two fingers. "Coffee?" He asked, in a low whisper.

Gerard sat up, rubbing his eyes and squinting in the evening light that was, honestly, just barely there, but enough to make him want to blink and flinch. "Why are you up?"

"I couldn't sleep. I'm surprised you could."

Gerard shrugged. He had no idea how he did it, but he took the mug anyway. "You can say that you're worried about me, it's alright. It's better than seeing it in your eyes."

"I am." Mikey drifted over and sat at the foot of the bed, back turned to the windows in the same way. "I just want you to be okay."

"I  _ am  _ okay, Mikey." He paused to drink a little. "Just doing a lot of thinking lately, that's all."

"I know, it's just that… I know you don't feel like you're enough for him because of all this, and if he ends up not valuing you as much as you deserve when this is over, then… I don't know what I'd do with myself."

"It'll be fine." Gerard reassured him, but with a hint of doubt in his voice. Mikey caught it right away. "It just takes time… I guess. Don't worry. I know that doesn't ease anything at all- but- promise me you won't tear yourself up anymore."

Mikey took a deep breath in and stood up. "I'll try. But you know how I am, I'm the chronic worrier of the family. I can't help it."

"I know you can't. It's not your fault that a couple people couldn't teach us right. You keep me out of trouble. You keep being you."

Mikey smiled with just the corners of his mouth and rubbed his face in Gerard's hair. He missed that dearly. 

He turned his back and left again and Gerard was alone with the ticking of his internal clock. Wonderful. More to think about and less time to absorb it. But no use in dread, Ray would be awake soon since the spot next to him in bed was empty for the first time in a week and his waist was gonna get cold soon. Gerard got himself up and out of bed and gathered up his freshest courage to go and shower. He hadn't done this in way too long and if he was going to leave a sweet taste in Frank's mouth tonight, he had to make sure he would actually taste sweet in the first place. He was gonna look nice for him even if it took all of his evening energy.

The water was warm and cleansing, leaving pink streaks down his chest from the long awaited sensation of the heat. He'd been cold for so long, despite it being June, that he'd forgotten how comforting warmth was. It also felt just like Frank, all over him, dragging from his scalp all the way down and pooling at his feet so he could step all over the texture. Gerard's hands in his hair no longer felt like his own, they were the loving, gentle, caring fingers and wrists and knuckles that he longed for. The soap almost made the scrubbing feel like clouds: airy and wispy. The hands on his arms were his, the hands on his chest, stomach, and hips were his, and the hands on his dick were his, most importantly. The heat was his and so was the summer, sweltering and hot-headed like the color of blood was the only cone left unscathed after the destruction. If Gerard was going to feel anything outside of himself, this was the one thing he'd choose over everything else. And to think that he spent all of the spring thinking that the frost belonged to Frank, but in reality, he was the burning, crackling, spark of the fire that raged on under the stove and the orange light that welcomed him in after a mile long walk. Frank was the sweat and the stroke, the sun and the burns. He was hot in the literal sense of the word because of the way Gerard swore that he'd always be ready to faint when he crossed his mind.

Even when those touches weren't feathery anymore, even when the pace quickened and he went from lightly teasing himself to full on begging for an orgasm from the inanimate shower tiles, his name still hovered over him like steam. He was clear-headed and desperate, hoping that the sensation was at least somewhat accurate and that it would all take his mind off of it for a while. It kind of did. He had to move to sit on the floor of the shower so his legs didn't give out, and the new angle made him finish almost immediately. He found himself repeating  _ 'thank you, thank you, thank you'  _ over and over again inside of his mind, finding peace in the aftermath, finally, and getting the reward for saying please.

_ "God,  _ fuck me." He whispered, letting the hot water work the tension from his muscles so that he could stand again and rinse the rest of the soap from his hair.

And there he was again, lovingly cleaning the dirt from his skin so that he could be worthy again. There he was again, proving once more that there was nothing more Godly than the heat of the fire of Hell.

Gerard finally stepped out, composed himself, and got dressed in as nice of a set of clothes as he could find without looking too overdone, balancing out with a crisp, freshly washed, navy blue v-neck and black jeans. Nothing too casual and nothing too fancy, he thought. It wasn't like it was so big of a deal that he had to feel insecure about his fashion choices, but, for fuck's sake, it was Frank, he always wanted to look nice for him.

A cloud of steam puffed out from the bathroom door as he opened it and he walked into the dining room to see everyone there, waiting for him.

"You look better." Ray remarked at Gerard's blow-dried hair.

"I  _ feel  _ better." He ran his hands down the front of his shirt out of nervous habit, smoothing wrinkles that weren't there this time. "Do you think he'll like me?"

Mikey raised one of his eyebrows. "Dude, it's not like this is your first date with the guy."

"I know, but just after…"

"I'm sure he will. One day at a time, Gee, remember?"

He nodded. Just as he took his first sip of coffee, three familiar knocks came from the other side of the door. Gerard filled his mouth with the drink, searing his tissue and completely ruining his sense of taste for the next five days, but he needed to get the caffeine in to survive the night. He looked at Mikey and Ray and they both disappeared behind the corner of the hallway, all with a clear shot of the door.

Gerard turned around and made his way to the door, slipping his shoes on as he went, clumsily tipping over and reaching for things to lean on. He pulled the knot on the last lace right as he got his hand on the knob.

One last look down at himself before he twisted it and saw Frank standing there, looking twice as gorgeous as he was the last time he'd seen him, wearing shorts and a tank top again so that his skin contrasted the total black wardrobe he must have crawled out of that morning. He looked slightly tanned, like he'd been working in his garden and sitting outside more often now that it was warmer, and his hair was tossed messily up and to the right. He looked perfect, all the way down to his low topped Converse shoes.

"Hey." He chimed, talking brightly like he had no idea the past month had ever even happened. It'd been exactly a month, too. "It's nice to see you." Frank seemed to smirk while he ran his eyes up and down Gerard's body. He ignored it. Or at least tried to, anyway.

"You too." Gerard wanted so badly to look at anything else but him so that he could maintain that Frank was  _ just a friend, _ but no matter what he did, he couldn't take his eyes off of him for longer than a couple seconds.

"You look nice." Frank tried to break the trance, but he only pulled Gerard further into it.

"So do you."  _ God,  _ I could kiss you right now, Gerard thought, no longer interested in developing his virtuous patience. The fruits of the Spirit were going to have to remain rotten a little while longer. He was bound to chase the Serpent and there was no reconciliation to be had anymore. At least on the inside, because on the outside, he was stiff and rigid and refusing to budge from his spot on the porch in front of who he needed to be the love of his life. Frank didn't seem all too concerned about it either.

"Listen," He started. "About all that… I'm sorry. I get a little ahead of myself sometimes and then I don't know how to explain it."

"Don't." Gerard interjected. "Don't be hard on yourself like that. We'll get there." 

Frank breathed deeply and his eyes looked fuller. "We will." His tone sounded half like a question and half like a statement. He almost looked like he wanted to take Gerard's hand and kiss it like he did before. Gerard ignored that too.

He could see how gruesomely he was fighting with himself. He could see the conflict inside of him that begged both for mercy and abstinence, not knowing whether to get closer or run. All Gerard could hope for was that his inner monologue was getting across to Frank's, and that screaming  _ 'it's okay'  _ in his head would be loud enough. He wanted him so bad and he could see him wanting him, so the magnets were turned toward each other, so close yet so far away. All they had to do was let time spin the other one around, and then they'd be bound so tightly that not even the smallest of particles could get in between the field. Nothing is really truly solid, just dense enough so that our molecules don't pierce the layers and destroy everything that matters, but as far as Gerard was concerned, he and Frank were solid through and through, and nothing could ever break in.

The car ride to Frank's was silent. So beautifully silent. Silent enough that Gerard could hear Frank's heart, and it was beating out of his chest. Silent enough so that he could just stare at him and his beautiful fucking everything. It wasn't even about his body anymore. It wasn't even about his kindness anymore. It wasn't even about the way he looked at him anymore. It wasn't even about how many times he'd repeated this exact sentiment before anymore. It was about how every ounce of Gerard was sure that what he was feeling was love, and that time was the only thing keeping him from pouring every ounce of it onto Frank. At this point, he didn't care about getting anything in return, the first step was to show him as much affection as he could until his heart gave out. Then, he smiled,  _ then  _ he'd wait oh so patiently for Frank to heal the strained heart strings with whatever he had in his own.

"Hey," Frank turned the ignition off and the forest whistled at him, gentle and lonesome in the night. "I quit smoking a couple weeks ago. For good. Hardest thing I've ever done but this is the best I've ever felt."

Gerard beamed. "That's awesome, Frank! I'm so proud of you." His breath hitched as he started to realize that he was very unsure of whether it was okay to add that at the end. Oh well.

"Thanks." There were those scanning eyes again, giving Gerard a visual of how extensive Frank's desire to run his hands all over him was.  _ That  _ he didn't ignore, but he kept it in the back of his mind for later instead. "That's the first time anyone's told me that so far."

Gerard's eyes widened. "Really? You  _ should  _ be proud of yourself."

"I am." He tapped his hands on the steering wheel. "Thanks, Gee."

Gerard's breath hitched again. He swallowed the lump in his throat and followed Frank to the door.

"I'm just gonna get some water, we can sit out in the garden if you'd like."

"Sure." He sighed, trying to keep his composure.

"Next is caffeine, and it's being a real pain in my ass." Frank chuckled as he filled a couple glasses with water from the tap.

"Let me know if you ever get that one cracked." Gerard took a cup from Frank's hand, bumping his finger. He held his breath.

"Oh, I'll be sharing that secret with the whole world. Smithsonian will demand to know my scientific methods."

"They should put you in one of their damn museums."

A patch of pink faded in and out on Frank's cheeks and Gerard bit his lip. That one he meant wholeheartedly.

Gerard hadn't realized before how lovely the weather was outside. Maybe it was being around Frank, finally, after an entire month of no contact, but he enjoyed the temperature for once.

"You know, I'm glad you're here." Frank looked over at him from his seat in the grass against the side of the house. Gerard joined him there. "I missed you."

"I guarantee you I missed you more."

"Bet you can't prove it." He snickered.

"You're right." Gerard sipped some water and it was cold against the warm summer air. "I can't ever prove it."

The stars weren't any more visible. The sky wasn't any clearer. The trees weren't any fresher. The grass wasn't any softer. The world was just the same as it had always been. Gerard wasn't sure why he had expected the galaxy to shift to make way for a realization of some kind. He wasn't sure why he ever expected anything to be handed to him like that, everything he had he stumbled into himself, but doing all the work gets old fast. A small, simple act of service couldn't possibly be too much of a laborious act for the infinite universe, but divinity doesn't just give out favors for free. The answer had always been right there, waiting for him, dressed in black. If it's right, you keep getting signs until you understand it, and then you can't miss them anymore. What's sacred won't let you forgive and forget; it will confront you with the blunt edge of the sword until your dumb ass figures out that you're supposed to be staring at the bladed edge at point blank range. At this point in their relationship, Gerard was starting to rotate and revolve around to the pointed tip, and Frank was the sun that kept his gravity in check. He was pretty sure that he was the center of his solar system and each breath sent him farther into orbit. 

He turned his head and got an eyeful of the side of Frank's face and there was the sword. Of course, there was nothing he could do about it, reaching for his face and kissing him wouldn't help the mess they were in. Gerard was stuck with the attraction as it boiled his skin down to the bone to expose his undying longing. Oh well, he thought, it's the most importantly and beautifully miserable I've been in a while. I'll keep it safe. 

"What do you think?" Frank asked, turning to meet Gerard's eyes as he still couldn't look away from him.

There were a thousand things he wanted to say. There were nine hundred words that couldn't be spoken and a hundred that would sink their teeth into his throat and thrash. The empty space refused to let its jaw go, joints clicking and dislocating and leaving him breathless and in a heap. It was no secret that he took his breath away. "Of what?" Was all he managed.

Frank looked a tad disappointed. Or maybe he was just sighing through his nose to stifle a laugh at Gerard's response. Either way, the pit in Gerard's stomach deepened and so did his gaze.

"You  _ know  _ what." His voice lowered.

Gerard looked up at the stars. Finally, he got the guts to look away from him, wondering if the stars would align in just the perfect way. They kind of did, in a sense, so Gerard returned to the space between Frank's eyes where he felt he belonged. They were so close. Inches were obsolete when they measured the distance between them in beats per minute. 

"Nothing I say will make it better." Gerard breathed shallowly. 

"That's not true." 

"What do you need from me?" Gerard whispered now, gently sending ripples through the water to keep from disturbing the synchronicity of their little magnetic field. 

"Everything." Frank replied, twitching slightly like he wanted to move in even closer to him. And Gerard thought he couldn't kiss him now, that classic wrench in his gut twisted his intestines until they tied a pretty little lacy bow. "I want you."

The silence around them was deafening. Gerard doubted that a single falling leaf would go unheard in the vacuum that they were sealed in. Somehow, whispering kept all the oxygen inside. The smallest of brainwaves would disrupt the steadiness of entropy and quadruple the power.

"If not now, then when?"

"It's always been now." Frank replied instantly, almost trying and almost failing to interrupt him, skipping at his heels like he had been with his texts and his calls. It seemed like Frank followed close behind him almost everywhere he went, even if it wasn't physically. He knew how to live in his head. He knew how to get through the ins and outs of pretty much everything and Gerard was thoroughly impressed, wondering how hard it would be to chase him right back to the other side of the yard. He wished he could get inside Frank's head instead, but for now, he was left to sit speechless inside his own and dwell on the mystery. 

"How long have you waited for now?" Gerard's eyes were soft to match the softness of Frank's face. 

"Just long enough." At that moment, Gerard was sure that Frank was going to slip his hand under his ear and kiss him and the lights would go out, but he just turned away to look at the stars. The gap opened up and the summer night turned to ice. Instead of warm, humid grass, there was nothing but glacial permafrost and the most desolate cold you can imagine. Gerard cozied up to it though, because sometimes what you're used to is the best thing to hold your structure up. 

But sometimes, cold fingers and toes hurt so bad that they burn, so Frank's fire is inescapable. "I want you too." 

Frank completed the eye contact again. Him and his beautiful body, his clothes, his hair, his piercings, his tattoos, his voice… 

"I need you. All of you. I hope this isn't weird or anything, but every cell in me wants you." 

"Every one, huh?" He questioned, poking Gerard in the chest. 

"All thirty seven trillion of them." 

Frank picked up Gerard's hand from its place, clutching blades of grass between his fingers. "Even these?" He pressed his own fingertip into the pad of Gerard's thumb. 

"All of them."

"And these?" He trailed his finger across a vein that was sticking out between his knuckles, tracing it up his arm a little. 

"Frank, when I say all of them, you know I do mean all of them."

"Shut up, it's just an excuse to touch you. I like to touch you… I guess." 

"I like it when you touch me." Just as Frank was pulling away, unsure, Gerard coached him back in, holding both his hands in his own now. "Which cells do you want to ask?" 

"These?" Frank asked, gently pushing his thumb into the inside of Gerard's elbow. 

"Yeah." He nodded, smiling just slightly when Frank looked up at him from the spaces of exposed skin that his soft hands touched. His other hand was still deeply intertwined with Gerard's. 

He didn't even have to ask anymore, his hand just slid up to his shoulder and over the right side of his neck- thank God, if He cares- until Frank's heavenly hand rested on Gerard's cheek. His thumb swiped back and forth once or twice. Gerard wasn't keeping count, he was trying to keep his tongue and his teeth inside his mouth. 

"You're beautiful." Frank whispered in a secretive manner, like he would hate for the forest to know about this.

"You are more than I could ever be." 

"You stop that." Down his neck again, over his other arm, to the tips of his fingers. "This is okay, right?" 

"Anything with you in it always is." 

That blasted pink patch flared up over Frank's cheeks. He looked like he shook it off and his hand fell right onto Gerard's thigh. He stopped his breath from slipping out of his throat. It's that undeniable spreading heat that you get when someone fills the void in your starving, empty heart that makes your soul finally feel safe enough to curl up and rest. 

Gerard picked Frank's hand up and flattened his palm against the center of his chest. "Do you feel that?" 

He nodded. 

"All of the blood in there, every fiber of that muscle, every cell that courses through all my veins, all my arteries…" 

Frank looked like he'd seen light for the first time. He looked like the color purple and a stick of wax that was two degrees away from melting. 

"Can you guess it?" Gerard held Frank's chin between two fingers. 

"With you, I don't have to."

"Then why do you ask?" 

"Because I like to see your face light up when you know the answer." Frank paused, counting the pulses under his shirt. "Why do you make me ask?" 

"Because I like listening to you talk." 

Frank scoffed. "You stop that."

"I don't think I will." 

"And neither will I." As Frank took his hand off, he slid it down the front of Gerard's shirt and his middle finger grazed the waistband of his jeans. 

Gerard almost grabbed it back and let him guess a few more answers to a few more of his questions, whichever he pleased. He almost begged for his hand around him, for his gentle touches, for his mouth, or his fingers, or his dick, or  _ anything,  _ but he kept his cool. He was actually a lot more composed than he thought he was, giving in to imagination in his own time made reality a lot easier to grasp. It wasn't so much of an  _ almost _ as it was  _ just a passing thought  _ that he might dream of acting on, but the impulse was very real and very possible, so, given his luck, there was much to plead for. 

"Follow me." Frank was standing up in front of him, knees touching his own with his arms outstretched for him to take. "I need to show you something." 

His scent was still everywhere inside the house. It still felt like he had his whole body pressed up against his in the way that he was surrounded by everything that made Frank human. He let his weight fall into the first chair inside the door, hard wooden tabletop failing to ease his nerves. Gerard watched Frank bound ahead of him and flip over the first record in a stack and drop the needle precisely near the middle of it. The first words he heard after the instruments were  _ 'sweet thing, I want you,'  _ and he followed Frank with his eyes while he floated around the room, plucking a dry, wilted leaf off of his basil plant and rubbing it on his neck. 

"Come here." He motioned him over with his finger. He just barely brushed the leaf under Gerard's chin. He looked like he had something to say. He looked like he wanted to gush the whole world's worth and more. He also looked like he wanted to lunge forward and make out with him, but he didn't spend too much time on that one. Frank pressed the leaf a little firmer in the same place. Gerard could smell it intensely and right away. 

There was so much that he wanted to tell him. There was so much that he could fix by finding out what he tasted like. There was so much to do that he had no idea where rationality began and ruin ended. Gerard caught the tail of it and furrowed his brow a little. "What?" He asked. 

Frank matched him, wrinkling his brows up too. "Nothing." He sounded peaceful. He sounded at ease, in awe, but Gerard didn't feel like it was time to place that he was in love yet. He knew  _ he  _ was, anyway. "We waited a month and all it took was sitting in my garden?" 

"No, Frank." Gerard put a hand on Frank's shoulder. "All it took was you."

"What do you mean?" 

"You  _ know  _ what." He mimicked.

"I do?" 

"Look at yourself." Gerard tilted his head down to figure out how and when Frank had laced his hands around his waist and when he'd laid his arms on top of his shoulders. Frank's fingers twitched. "I look at you and I'm sure. How could it  _ not  _ be you?" 

"We need more time- I- I don't know what to-" 

"I know." He cooed. "It's okay, so do I, but you'll know. I'll know. Because all it takes is you. And all this time, it's always been you." 

"I'm sorry." 

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Frank. You take all the time that you need. I'll be waiting for you, because I'm ready for you. I look at you and I'm sure." 

"Tell me how you do it." Frank melted into his touch even more, becoming liquid in his grip. 

"That's for when you're sure. For later. I'll be back for you, okay?" He started to untangle himself and move for the door. 

"Wait-" Frank cut in, catching his hand. He didn't say anything. He just stared at him for a few seconds before he let go again. 

"You okay?" 

"Yeah." Frank nodded. "I am when it's just you."

"Good. It's just me. I'll see you soon, won't I?" Gerard turned over his shoulder to look at Frank again, standing there in front of his record player in a tank top and shorts, basil leaf in hand. 

"Yeah, you will." 

He shut the door and used up so much of his strength to keep walking that he was too exhausted at the end of the street corner to run like he'd wanted to. 

Gerard was so in love with him that his bones hurt. He was so enamored by him that he cried. Crying alone on a dark summer night at ten o'clock, roaming the empty roads to find the way back home with blurry vision was not how he wanted to spend the eve of the sabbat. He was gonna see Ruth tomorrow and he was gonna tell her all about tonight, but first he had to make sure that he'd live to tell the tale. 

Eventually, he did find the little green sign before Carter and the little wooden porch stairs behind the hedges that hid the pathetic, cracked, and gravelly circle drive. But none of it mattered anymore. None of it drummed up the same old sadness. All those little things did was make him more excited to fill them with Frank. All they did was make him want to lead him by the hand and show him every inch of everything. But for now, he had to stick to wishing, because, even though he'd do anything to experience that right that second, he couldn't risk someone as wonderful as Frank just for a rush. This was the first time he'd seen him in a month, and it had gone so well that he was sure that this time wouldn't take long. He'd promised that he'd just see him as a friend, they both had, but if time does one thing, it's tell, tell, tell. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned till next friday !!!


End file.
